NARENDRA SINGH Vs. COAL INDIA LIMITED

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner has filed this petition challenging order dated 9.12.1998 by which a penalty of reduction to a lower stage in time scale for a period of two years has been imposed upon the petitioner. The petitioner has also challenged the order dated 1/5.4.1999 by which the appeal filed by the petitioner has been dismissed by the Appellate Authority.

(2.) THE brief facts, leading to the filing of the present petition, are that the petitioner, who at the relevant time was working as a Survey Officer in the establishment of the respondents, was a member of the Annual Coal Measurement Team and was directed to measure the available stock as on 1.4.1996 of the Ardhagram Open Cast Mine of Satgram Area of Eastern Coal Field Limited. Accordingly, the Annual Measurement Team of which the petitioner was a member, measured the coal stock of the said mine on 4.5.1996 and reported the total stock of 47421 M.T. It is stated that subsequently a check team also measured the stock in the said mine on 5.8.1996 and reported a stock of 30785 M.T of coal. On 29.1.1997 a third investigating team measured the coal stock of the said mind and reported a total stock of 9659.36 M.T of coal.

(3.) IT is further submitted by the learned counsel for the petitioner that in fact the measurement of the mine concerned was conducted by three teams; the Annual Measurement Team in which the petitioner was a member, the Check Team and the Investigating Team, and the measurements recorded by all the three teams vastly differed as is evident from the table 7.1 reproduced by the Inquiry Officer on internal page 19 of his report. It is submitted that while the authorities have totally ignored the difference in measurement between the Check Team and the Investigating Team, it has singled out the petitioner as a member of the Annual Measurement Team and subjected him to hostile discrimination.