M N BHAGAT Vs. HARYANA STATE ELECTRICITY BOARD

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Petitioner, Shri M.N. Bhagat, who was working as a Superintending Engineer (Civil), with the Haryana State Electricity Board (hereinafter called the Board), was served with the charge-sheet by the Board levelling four charges, which are reproduced below :-

(2.) The learned counsel for the petitioner, inter alia, argued that apart from other grounds of attack, the impugned order was liable to be set aside on the short ground that it was not a speaking order. He submitted that the petitioner had given a detailed reply to the show cause notice and the impugned order does not deal with the points raised by him in the reply to the show cause notice. He has argued that from the proposed punishment of removal from service, the Board thought it proper to impose punishment only of stoppage of one increment with cumulative effect. From this fact, it could not be ruled out that some of the charges were ultimately held to be not proved after the consideration of the petitioner's reply to the show cause notice. He submitted that no reasons have been given as to why the punishment of stoppage of one increment with cumulative effect was called for in spite of his reply to the show cause notice. In support of his contention, he relied upon a Single Bench Judgment of this Court in T.N. Bansal v. State of Haryana,1986 3 SLJ 101 and drew my pointed attention to paragraph 2 of the judgment, which reads as under :-

(3.) On the other hand, the learned counsel for the respondents did not dispute the proposition that the order imposing punishment had to be a speaking order, but maintained that the impugned order was speaking order. According to him, the matter had been considered by the Board and detailed reasons have been given in the minutes of the meeting as to why the punishment of stoppage of one increment with cumulative effect was being imposed. He referred to the pleadings in paragraphs 40 and 41 of the written statement, as also the pleadings in paragraphs 46 to 49 of the written statement. As far as the pleadings in paragraphs 40 and 41 are concerned, these are the reproduction of the minutes of the Board's meeting prior to the issuance of the show cause notice when the Board was considering report of the Enquiry Officer, as to whether the Board was agreeing with the enquiry report and if so, what punishment was to be proposed. The minutes show that after agreeing with the enquiry report, the Board was of the tentative view that punishment of removal from service should be imposed on the petitioner, and, therefore, a decision was taken to issue a show cause notice to that effect. As far as the pleadings in paragraphs 46 and 49 are concerned, these are the minutes of the meeting of the Board after the reply to show cause notice, had been considered. The minutes are reproduced for ready reference :-