COCHIN DEVASWOM BOARD Vs. AKHILESWARA IYER

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These two appeals and O.P. No. 825 of 1959 arise from disputes between the Principal and the Management of Sri Kerala Varma College, Trichur. The Cochin Devaswom Board, which had been vested with authority under S.62 of the Travancore-Cochin Hindu Religious Institutions Act, 1950, is the appellant in both the appeals and is the respondent in the writ petition. The aforesaid section directs that the administration of incorporated and unincorporated Devaswoms and Hindu Religious Institutions under the management of the Ruler of Cochin prior to July 1st, 1949, or under the Cochin Hindu Religious Institutions Act, 1 of 1081, should vest in the Board; and the appellant, therefore, manages Sri Kerala Varma College, Trichur, which was started in 1947 and is being run with funds from one such institution. A.V. Akhileswara Iyyer, the respondent to the appeals before us, was on August 16th 1947, appointed as a Professor and the Head of the Department of History and Economics; in June 1951 made by the then Devaswom Board the Vice Principal of the College; and from December 1st, 1951, appointed as the Principal. He continued as the College Principal, and in October, 1958, interviewed the new members of the appellant Board. There was discussion regarding the administration of the College, and the Principals case is that the members criticised some actions taken earlier, particularly those relating to the retrenchment of one Namboodhiri, who was a lecturer in the College, and to the refusal to promote one Mrs. Sathi M. Warrier, a lecturer in English. The Principals case further is that the new members found fault with him for not pleading before the previous Board for the retention of the aforesaid Namboodiripad in the service of the College; a week after the interview, the Principal was, on October 8th, 1958, served with a resolution by the Board giving the Boards version of what happened at the interview; and, he on October 23rd 1958, sent a letter giving his account of what actually then transpired. The Principal in his first writ petition to this Court avers that he pointed in this communication various discrepancies between what happened and what, according to the Board, took place at the interview, and requested the mistakes being rectified. Thereafter the Board on October 29th, 1958, sent a communication charging the Principal with misconduct and informing him that his service would be terminated. The communication further called upon the Principal to submit explanations on or before November 12th, 1958. That is one part of the quarrel. The next is that the Principal on October 30th, 1958, received a memorandum from the Secretary informing him about the Devaswom Commissions direction of the College Library being checked. During the checking a number of questions were sent to the Principal regarding purchase of books, and on December 4, 1958, the Principal received a letter suspending him from the Office with immediate effect & directing him to hand over the charge to the Professor of Commerce in the College. This act of the Board was challenged in this Court by O.P. 839/1958, and a learned Judge, on April 3rd, 1959, issued the writ quashing the aforesaid order. A.S. No. 604/59 before us is against the aforesaid order by the learned Judge.

(2.) The next stage in the dispute between the Principal and the appellant begins soon after the writ was passed by the learned Judge. Having obtained the writ, the Principal had applied to be reinstated in the service and had also asked for arrears of his salary with increments, to which he claimed to have become entitled from October 1st, 1958. The appellant then issued a notice dated April 6, 1959 directing the Principal to substantiate some of the allegations made by him in the affidavit to his earlier writ petition. The appellant had also required the Principal to furnish his explanations to the charge sheet, which was dated earlier and consisted of ten charges about the Principals conduct regarding the College Library. Both these were made the basis of the appellants order dated April 8, 1959, whereby the Principal was dismissed. It will be useful to give extract from the order, which was also challenged by another writ petition in this Court. The relevant extracts read thus:-

(3.) The writ petition to vacate the order, was filed on April 14, 1959, numbered as O.P. 540/1959, and one of the grounds taken was that the Boards decision was bad, because it was by judges in their own cause. Our learned brother, Vaidialingam, J., held that the Board had no jurisdiction to pass any orders based upon proceedings originally intended to be taken but closed long ago. He further held that in these circumstances, there was no jurisdiction to pass the order, which must be quashed in exercise of the powers under Art.226. A.S. No. 759/1959 is the appeal against the aforesaid decision, and thereby the aforesaid stage of the dispute between the parties concludes.