RAMCHANDRA NAMA ADHAV Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Two points of law arise for decision in this second appeal, the first being the question as to whether the judicial review is permissible by a Civil Court in relation to the Disciplinary proceedings that have gone through the full exercise of a Departmental Enquiry or in other words, put very briefly, whether the Civil Court would be justified in virtually sitting in Appeal over such Departmental Disciplinary proceeding. More importantly, the cardinal issue canvassed is as whether in cases where the incident is trivial and the evidence both patchy and shaky, a department of the Government is at all justified in law in frittering away public time and money by going through the exercise of disciplinary proceedings, not to mention the harassment, torture and trauma, to which the employee is subjected. Put more briefly, the point that crystallises is as to whether or not there exists a responsibility on the concerned department to first ascertain as to whether there exists a justifiable case to proceed against the errant employee.

(2.) The facts of this case are as gross as they are pathetic. The appellant Ramchandra Adhav was a Senior Engine Driver with the Central Railway, having put in about 30 years of service as per the statement made by his Counsel Mr. Master at the Bar. He appears to have arisen from the lowest rung of the ladder and on 21-1-1978 was operating the engine of goods train No. S-40 up running from Daund to Pune. At about 19.10 hours the train stopped at the Home Signal of the Khamgaon railway station. The engine in question was a steam engine and admittedly there were two other firemen in the engine. According to the petitioner, because of the stiff gradient and some leackage in the vaccume system, the train came to a halt. It was a long goods train with about 45 wagons and the appellant walked down the side of the train to ascertain where the fault was and after locating it, he walked upto the brake van which was the last of the bogies. The R.P.F. Inspector Mr. Gour, was in the brake van. According to him he saw some ladies carrying lumps of coal on their heads and he apprehended them. It is his case that he also recovered a sum of Rs. 5/- from the pocket of the appellant. According to him the appellant was responsible for dropping the coal from the tender of the engine, that the said coal was thereafter allowed to be taken away by the three women from whom the appellant is alleged to have recovered 1/- rupee each. Appropriate proceedings were subsequently instituted which resulted in the service of a charge-sheet against the appellant. The two charges against him were that being a railway servant, he had deliberately dropped the coal from the tender of the engine and secondly he is alleged to have recovered Rs. 1/- each from the three women and committed an act of mis-conduct by recovering money through illegal disposal of railway property.

(3.) The appellant denied the charges and he contended that he had absolutely nothing to do with the alleged removal of lumps of coal by the three women. He submitted that the R.P.F. Inspector, had implicated him under suspicion. Significantly enough, he pointed out that the train was a very long one, that it was a goods train with no light in any of the wagons except the engine and brake van; that it was dark at that time as admitted by the guard himself and that consequently it was physically impossible for a person who was in the brake van at the opposite end of the goods train, to have been able to even see what was happening at the engine and who was responsible for the same. The Enquiry Officer, however, relied heavily on the fact that even though the three women denied in the enquiry that they either knew the appellant or that they had paid him any money or that he had dropped the coal for them, relied on the fact that these women had been convicted by the learned Magistrate for being in unlawful possession of the railway property namely the coal and held the present appellant guilty of the charges of mis-conduct. After consideration of his representation, the disciplinary authority passed an order for removal from service. It is this order, that came to be challenged by the appellant in Regular Civil Suit No. 57 of 1979.