S. RADHAKRISHNAN Vs. DISTRICT COLLECTOR, DHARMAPURI DISTRICT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Heard Ms.A.Pramila, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner and Mr.M.Shahjahan, learned Special Government Pleader for the respondents.

(2.) The petitioner herein was appointed as an Office Assistant in the office of the District Collector, Dharmapuri, on 12/11/1991 on compassionate ground, owing to the death of his father K.Sundaram. The petitioner had joined the services on 15/11/1991. Thereafter, he was promoted as Junior Assistant on 21/1/1994. Since the minimum qualification prescribed for the post of Junior Assistant is S.S.L.C., a proposal was sent to the Government for the purpose of regularizing the petitioner's service in the cadre of Junior Assistant. In turn, the Government had forwarded the petitioner's S.S.L.C. certificate to the State Schools Examination Board, Chennai, for verification. Consequently, the Secretary of the State Schools Examination Board, in his report dtd. 17/7/2003, had stated that the S.S.L.C. certificate produced by the petitioner was bogus and the Registration No.551966/April 1991 in the certificate was actually allotted to another candidate. In accordance with the letter of the Secretary of the State Schools Examination Board, dtd. 17/7/2003, the charges under Rule 17(b) of the Tamil Nadu Civil Services (Discipline and Appeal) Rules (hereinafter referred to as 'the Rules') came to be framed against the petitioner in charge memo dtd. 23/3/2004. Not being satisfied with the explanation submitted by the petitioner, an enquiry was conducted, in which the charges against the petitioner were held as proved. The further explanation submitted by the petitioner on 5/1/2006 came to be rejected, through the impugned order of punishment dtd. 21/5/2007, whereby, the petitioner was dismissed from service. The appeal preferred by the petitioner on 8/6/2007 was also rejected on 29/2/2016. Challenging the original order of punishment, as well as the order-in-appeal, the present writ petition has been filed.

(3.) The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that when the petitioner had sought for information under the provisions of the Right to Information Act, seeking for details about his S.S.L.C. certificate Registration No.551966/April 1991, the Information Officer attached to the State Schools Examination Board, in his reply dtd. 22/9/2015, has stated that the said registration number belongs to the petitioner herein. The learned counsel further submitted that the enquiry was not properly conducted and the documents produced before the Enquiry Officer were not substantiated through oral witnesses.