K BALARAMAN Vs. DISTRICT COLLECTOR,

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The relief sought for herein is to quash the impugned punishment of stoppage of increment for one year without cumulative effect and for consequential direction to the respondent to sanction all service benefits such as fixation of pay, sanction of annual increments, withholding of promotion and all the benefits attached to the post during the relevant period and to disburse all the monetary benefits within a reasonable time.

(2.) The few facts which are relevant for consideration herein are as follows : while, the petitioner was holding the post of Zonal Deputy Tahsildar, Thiruvallur during 01.12.1998 to 30.04.1999, there was serious complaint made to the High Court against large scale removal of sand from Kusasthalai river by certain private contractors. The High Court appointed the Advocate Commissioner who inspected and reported that there has been illegal quarrying of sand from 27.05.1999. The learned single judge of this Court on the basis of such report, directed the appropriate authority for initiating action against the officials, in whose period the illegal sand quarrying was held and also directed the District Collector, Thiruvallur to issue charge memo under Rule 17(b) of TNCS(D&A) Rules against few officers.

(3.) In pursuance of the order of this Court, the petitioner as well as seven officers were issued with identical charge memo, containing three charges alleging dereliction of duty in not taking action against illicit quarrying and enquiry was conducted and enquiry report was filed holding the charges not proved against the petitioner herein. Similar report holding the charges not proved was filed in respect of few other officers, mainly on the ground that the petitioner and other officers by name Kandavel and V.Krishnasamy were transferred from the particular area much before the delinquency period. However, the report of the Enquiry officer was accepted by the District Collector in respect of Kandavel and in respect of V.Krishnasamy by the Government. The report in respect of the present petitioner was not accepted by the District Collector. The District Collector having disagreed with the findings of the enquiry officer, issued show cause notice to the petitioner to appear for enquiry and the petitioner appeared before the Enquiry officer and the same was followed by the impugned order holding all the three charges proved against the petitioner and by imposing punishment of stoppage of increment for one year without cumulative effect. Aggrieved against the same, the petitioner approached the Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal by way of OA.No.6592 of 2000 and the same was transferred to this Court by way of present writ petition.