SITARAM CHOUDHARY Vs. STATE OF BIHAR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) IN this application prayer of the petitioner is to quash the departmental proceeding pending against him.

(2.) SHORN of unnecessary details, facts giving rise to the present case are that during the relevant time the petitioner was posted as Ranger at Lalganj and it has been alleged that on 11.12.1997, he was caught red handed while accepting a bribe of Rs. 1,500/ - from the owner of a truck bearing Registration no. B.H.G. 5222. Accordingly Vigilance Case No. 42 of 1997 was registered against him and he was taken into custody. By order dated 24.1.1998 he was put under suspension. He challenged the same by filing a writ application before this Court; which was registered as C.W.J.C. No. 4916 of 1999 and a learned single Judge of this Court by order dated 16.8.1999 quashed the order of suspension. Thereafter a departmental enquiry was initiated against him and memo of charges (Annexure -4) was served on him. Later on by memo dated 1.12.2000 (Annexure -6) one Sri AshoK Prasad, Conservator of Forest, Gaya Division and Sri Parsuram Ram, Divisional Forest Officer, Patna were appointed as Enquiry and Presenting officers respectively. Charge against the petitioner in the departmental enquiry is that he took bribe of a sum of Rs. 1,500/ - which is punishable under section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. In the criminal case instituted against the petitioner, the allegation is one and the same.

(3.) WHEN acquittal in a criminal case does not stand in the way of continuation of departmental proceeding by no stretch of imagination it can be said that its pendency would bar the same.