LAL BAHADUR Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) ALL these three writ petitions bearing No. 1871/89 Lal Bahadur vs. State of Raj. (1), No. 1907/89 Ranjit Singh vs. State of Raj. (2) and No. 1799/89 Puran Ram Sharma vs. State of Raj. (3) arise out of a common incident wherein it is alleged that the statements of the petitioners Shri Lal Bahadur and Shri Ranjit Singh which were recorded in the enquiry of Shri Jagdish Chand Khurana were handed over to Shri Puran Ram and it is alleged that these statements after they were signed by the particular officer of the respondent, they were delivered to Shri Puran Ram. However, after their delivery to Shri Puran Ram, it is alleged that at the behest of Shri J. C. Khurana, these two persons i. e. Shri Lal Bahadur and Shri Ranjeet Singh recorded their statements separately and substituted them for the original statements which were handed over to Shri Puran Ram. It is alleged that it is a serious misconduct as per statute 26 (b) and 20 in which it is provided that changing of record or substituting of the record is a serious misconduct. It is alleged that all these three petitioners i. e. Lal Bahadur, Ranjit Singh and Puran Ram were called by the Managing Director and they were asked to explain their conduct and the explanation that was furnished by them, was not convincing in the opinion of the Managing Director and, therefore, he dismissed them from service vide order Annex. 7 (in case of Shri Puran Ram) vide Annex. 4 (in case of Shri Lal Bahadur and Shri Ranjit Singh in their respective writ petitions ). It is against these dismissal orders that the petitioners have preferred their writ petitions. It was contended on behalf of the petitioners by Mr. Sandhu that a particular procedure has been provided by Statute 28 for holding an enquiry for any act of misconduct or serious misconduct and in that statute, it is provided that an Enquiry Officer will be appointed, charges will be served on the petitioners, the petitioners will be informed of the appointment of the Enquiry Officer who will fix a date and place for holding the enquiry, ample opportunity will be provided to the delinquents to lead evidence in rebuttal. The delinquent in such an enquiry can be assisted by a co-worker and, thereafter after hearing both the parties, a report will be made on which the Competent Authority will pass the orders. It is an admitted case of. the parties that this procedure has not been followed. Only the Managing Director called these delinquents, sought explanation from them for their misconduct and on being dissatisfied with their explanation, he has dismissed them from service and, therefore, this dismissal is ex-facie against statute 28. The contention of the respondents is that the petitioners have filed an appeal before the Collector who is the Administrator of the respondents' mill and certain procedure has been provided for filing such an appeal against the order of Managing Director of the respondent mill. Actually, that relates to the grievances of the workers as regards their day to day working. This Schedule 3 which relates to grievance procedure, does not relate to an order of dismissal passed as a result of their misconduct of serious misconduct and, therefore, this preliminary objection has no force. When the order of dismissal has been passed against the statutory rules that have been framed for the conduct of the workers of the spinning mill then that procedure has to be adopted before dismissal of a workman. If a particular procedure is provided and a particular officer is required to act in a particular manner then that procedure has to be followed by the authority concerned as provided by the statute and if that is not done then such a dismissal cannot be sustained. These petitioners have already been taken back in service under the orders of this Court and they are still continuing in service under the interim orders of this Court. Be that as it may, as the aforesaid orders of dismissal marked Annex. 7 in case of Puran Ram and Annex. 4 in case of Shri Ranjit Singh and Lal Bahadur have been passed against the Statute 28, they are hereby quashed. The respondent No. 2 is directed to keep them in service and the petitioners shall be treated to be in continuous service of the respondent mill from the date of their dismissal. However, the respondents will be free to hold any enquiry for their misconduct and if they are found guilty, the respondents will be free to impose any penalty on them as they deem proper after following the proper procedure prescribed by the Statute.

(2.) ALL these aforesaid writ petitions stand disposed of accordingly on merits. .