KAILASHCHAND PATHAK Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The grievance voiced by the petitioners, in these two writ petitions is two-fold, viz., (i) "Whether any delinquent employee of the Railway can be removed and/or dismissed from service without taking into consideration the self-defence pleaded by him repudiating the allegations levelled against him in the Charge-sheet?" and (ii) Quite incidentally enough, the off-shoot of the said grievance is the second question - as to "what indeed is the meaning of the word 'considered' appearing in subrule (9) of Rule 44 of the Railway Protection Force Rules, 1959 ?"

(2.) Few relevant facts as far as they are necessary to understand and set at resolve the aforesaid two grievances, it may briefly be stated that two petitioners - namely, Kailash Chand Pathak and Prabhat Sinh, who were serving as Rakshaks in the Railway Protection Force were served with the charge-sheet dated 18-11-1981 alleging that on 13-5-1981 not only they absented from their respective duty at the gate of Sabarmati Engineering Works at Ahmedabad but both of them were also found clandestinely carrying iron rivets and the scrap materials (the railway property) in a bag placed on the carrier of their bicycles. The Inquiry Officer thereafter holding that the said allegations were true submitted a report to the Disciplinary Authority, who in his turn issued show-cause notice to them, and ultimately removed them from their service by an Order dated 17-8-1982. These orders of removal were challenged before the Daputy Chief Security Officer, Western Railway, Bombay, which in turn came to be rejected by the Order dated 25-2-1983. Thereafter both the petitioners submitted a mercy petition to the Chief Security Officer on 21-4-1983. However, as the same was not responded to, the petitioners were ultimately constrained to approach this Court by way of the present two writ petitions inter alia praying for quashing and setting aside the impugned orders of removal from service and also to reinstate them with all service benefits, including the back-wages.

(3.) Mr. I. S. Supehia, the learned Advocate for the petitioners though has raised several contentions in the memo of the petitions, has ultimately chosen to confine himself to only one point, viz., that since the Disciplinary Authority, while passing the impugned order of removal has not taken into consideration the defence of the petitioners, the same was ex-fade illegal and thus deserves to be quashed and set aside. Making good this contention, Mr. Supehia has relied upon sub-rules (9) and (10) of Rule 44 of the Railway Protection Force Rules, 1959, which reads as under: