SUNIL KUMAR SANKHALA Vs. STATE OF RAJASTHAN

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner, Sunil Kumar Sankhala, was working as Assistant Accountant on contractual basis in the respondent Panchayati Samiti -Suwana, in Gram Panchayat -Richada, for the period 12.05.2008 to 01.03.2010. He, however, resigned from the said post and joined the services as an Accountant in the "Chhabra Power Plant Ltd." under the appointment order (Annex. 6) dated 24.02.2010. The Coordinator of the NREGA Scheme, the District Collector, Bhilwara, gave a show cause notice to the present petitioner vide Annex. 2 dated 23.10.2010 to give explanation about certain irregularities committed by the petitioner while he was working as Assistant Accountant in the Panchayati Raj Department for various financial years, for which, huge Budgets were allocated for implementation of various scheme under the NREGA and the present petitioner working as Assistant Accountants failed to take proper steps for preventing cash purchases, not inspected the cash book etc. and that resulted in certain defalcations. A preliminary enquiry appears to have been made in the present case as would appear from Annex. 4 of 14.05.2010 purportedly holding that the petitioner as Assistant Accountant, could not be held responsible for such irregularities as there were no standards of audits set down by that time. The Annex. 4 is an Office -note prepared in the office of Zila Parishad, Bhilwara, however, it is not clear as to who has held this enquiry and what was the process of such preliminary enquiry.

(2.) THE petitioner approached this Court when vide the Annex. 5 communication dated 28.01.2011, the Commissioner -cum -Secretary of E.G.S., Rural Development & Panchayati Raj Department, Mr. Tanmay Kumar, sent the aforesaid communication to the District Collector, Bhilwara, for initiating an enquiry and action against various officials of the said Gram Panchayat, Richada in Panchayat Samiti -Suwana in connection with aforesaid works implemented under the NREGA Scheme and while directing action against various officials working in the said Gram Panchayat, including actions to be taken by converting the enquiry under Rule 17 to Rule 16 of the CCS (CCA) Rules, filing of FIR(s). Vide the Para 10 and 11 of the said communication, in which para 10 pertains to the present petitioner and other para 11 pertains to one Om Prakash Bairwa, who was Programme Officer during the contemporary period in the Panchayat Samiti -Suwana, it was stated as under: -

(3.) THE respondent -Panchayati Raj Department has filed reply to the writ petition, inter -alia, contesting the present writ petition and the learned counsel for the respondents, Mr. Manish Patel, Addl. Govt. Counsel, also vehemently submitted that the present writ petition is premature and to his information, the writ petition filed by other person, namely, Om Prakash Bairwa, was also dismissed by this Court as premature.