GOPAL SINGH Vs. STATE OF RAJ. & ORS.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The facts of this case depict the dismal story of the petitioner's suffering the agony of suspension ever since 1974. The petitioner who had started his career as a Ward-boy on 1st Sept., 1954 was promoted as Driver on 18th Aug., 1970. On 10th April, 1974 while he was working as Driver in the office of Dy. Chief Medical and Health Officer (Malaria), Medical and Health Department, Alwar an order was passed placing the petitioner under suspension in contemplation of the disciplinary proceedings. After placing the petitioner under suspension by order dated 10th April, 1974, the proceedings which were contemplated against him and on account of which he was placed under suspension, were put in oblivion and the same remained under hibernation. The Department suddenly woke up in Nov., 1988 when by a memo dated 4th Nov., 1988 an inquiry under Rule 16 of the CCA Rules was proposed against the petitioner and the charges which have been levelled against the petitioner now in the year 1988 are for the incident of 1974 as under:- The petitioner filed the reply to the said memo on 7th Dec., 1988. The petitioner has denied the charge. Even after Dec., 1988 no effective proceedings have taken place and the petitioner has stated while filing the writ petition on 9th Jan., 1990 that the last date in these proceedings for appearing before the Department was 19th June, 1989 as pointed out by Mr. Y.C. Sharma, appearing on behalf of the petitioner.

(2.) When this case came up before this Court on 6th March, 1990, a notice was ordered to be issued as to why this writ petition should not be admitted/disposed of. The service was effected on respondents and appearance was also entered and on the last date when the matter came up before this Court on 22nd Aug., 1990, the time was again granted to file the reply. No reply has been filed and the matter comes up before this Court for final disposal.

(3.) The sole contention raised by Mr. Y.C. Sharma before me is that the incident is as old as of 1974 for which the charge-sheet has been served in 1988 and no useful purpose would be served to continue these proceedings against the petitioner and the charge-sheet and proceedings against him must be quashed only on the ground of departmental inaction for not holding the proceedings for all these years. No explanation whats over has been furnished on behalf of the respondents as to why the proceedings were not taken from 1974 and why the charge-sheet was issued as late as in Nov., 1988 and why no effective proceedings have been held even thereafter. The only verbal submission made by the Addl. Govt. Advocate is that in this case a preliminary inquiry was held in the year 1987 and, therefore, the charge-sheet was issued in the year 1988. This is all the more painful that even preliminary inquiry was held in the year 1987 and yet in 1974 the petitioner was placed under suspension on the ground that an inquiry was contemplated against him. Shri Y.C. Sharma has placed reliance on the recent decision of the Supreme Court reported in AIR 1990 S.C. 1308, State of Madhya Pradesh Vs. Bani Singh Para 4 of this case may be appropriately reproduced as under;-