IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) WEDNESDAY, THE TWELFTH DAY OF MARCH TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE C.V.NAGARJUNA REDDY WRIT PETITION NO : 5608 of 2007 Between: Smt. A.Padmavathi, W/o. Govindaiah, Adivipalem Village, Santhamaguluru, Prakasam Dist. ..... PETITIONER AND 1 The Collector and District Magistrate, Prakasam District, Ongole. 2 The Joint Collector Prakasam District, Ongole. 3 The Revenue Divisional Officer, Prakasam District, Ongole. 4 The Mandal Revenue Officer, Santhamagurluru, Prakasam Dist. .....RESPONDENTS Counsel for the Petitioner:MR.I.GOPALA REDDY Counsel for the Respondents: GP FOR CIVIL SUPPLIES The Court made the following : ORDER: This writ petition is filed for a writ of certiorari to quash proceedings vide Rc.CS2/774/2006, dated 27.02.2007 of respondent No.1 whereby he confirmed order, dated 22.09.2005 passed by respondent No.2 and also order, dated 14.05.2005 passed by respondent No.3 cancelling fair price shop authorization of the petitioner in respect of Adivipalem Village, Santhamaguluru Mandal, Prakasam District. Heard Sri I.Gopala Reddy, learned counsel for the petitioner and the learned Government Pleader for Civil Supplies. On the basis of inspection conducted by the Enforcement Deputy Tahsildar, Addanki, the Mandal Revenue Officer, Santhamaguluru - respondent No.4 submitted a report on 20.09.2004, wherein he made following allegations against the petitioner. “1. that the dealer is selling the ECs at the higher rates i.e. Rice @ Rs.7.00 per Kg and K.Oil is at Rs.11-00 per liter. 2. That the dealer has diverted 46 Kgs of rice in each month by making bogus entries from 1/04 to 5/04 totally 2.30 qtls of rice and diverted to black market. 3. That the dealer has not exhibit the stock and price list particulars in the stock board. 4. That the dealer is not distributing the Ecs to the card holders properly.” Initially, the petitioner’s authorization was suspended on 28.09.2004 and a show cause notice was issued on 04.10.2004. The petitioner submitted her representation on 06.11.2004. The appeal filed by the petitioner against the order of suspension was disposed of by respondent No.2 on 10.01.2005 with the direction to respondent No.3 to finalise the enquiry. After hearing the petitioner and her counsel on 05.05.2005 and 12.05.2005, respondent No.3 passed order on 14.05.2005 whereby he found the petitioner guilty of the four charges and cancelled the petitioner’s fair price shop dealership. The petitioner was unsuccessful in her appeal filed before respondent No.2 and revision filed before respondent No.1 with their dismissal on 22.09.2005 and 27.02.2007 respectively. Feeling aggrieved by these orders, the petitioner filed this writ petition. In his order, respondent No.3 considered the four charges. Charge No.1 relates to the petitioner selling the essential commodities at higher rates. Respondent No.3 extracted the explanation of the petitioner with respect to the said charge, in which, she denied the charge and stated that there is absolutely no proof and none of the cardholders gave any complaint against her. It is interesting to extract the finding of respondent No.3. “Some of the card holders of the FP shop area were made complaint to the Inquiry officer that the dealer is distributing the rice at higher rates than the rates fixed by the Govt. i.e. rice is at Rs.7.00 per kg instead of Rs.5.25 and K.oil is at Rs.11.00 per liter instead of Rs.9.50 and it is held proved that the dealer is distributing ECs at higher rates than the rates fixed by the Govt. and hence she violated the condition No.7 under grant of authorization.” This finding is totally vague and bereft of any details whatsoever. Respondent No.3 failed to give the names of the cardholders, who made complaint against the petitioner for selling the essential commodities at higher prices. The conclusion of respondent No.3 “it is held proved that the dealer is distributing essential commodities at higher rates” is not supported by any discussion made in the order. There is no reference to any evidence whatsoever referred to by him. This finding is, therefore, without any basis. Charge No.2 relates to diversion of 46 kgs of rice into black market in each month by making bogus entries from January, 2004 to May, 2004 totalling to 2.30 quintals of rice. In her explanation, the petitioner while denying the said allegation stated that she submitted all the coupons to the Mandal Revenue Officer and that after verification, he was satisfied about the distribution and allowed her to distribute the commodities for the months of July, August and September, 2004 and that this fact clearly shows that this allegation was subsequently invented for the purpose of implicating her at the instance of the opposite political group. She also asserted that there is absolutely no proof that she diverted rice into black market as mentioned in the show cause notice and termed the charge as baseless and false. The finding of respondent No.3 on the said charge reads as under: “The card holders of the FP shop area have filed unused coupons bearing Coupon Nos.069527, 027501, 69517, 012417 to Inquiry Officer that they were not taken rice from the FP shop dealer. On perusal of the record, it is observed that there is no closing balances shown by the dealer from ¼ to 4/04. Hence, it is presumed that the dealer misused the stock of the above cardholders and diverted to black market. Hence, the allegation levelled against the dealer is held proved and violated the condition No.17 (a)(b)(c) under APSPDS (Control) Order, 2001.” In respect of this finding also, respondent No.3 failed to discuss any material against the petitioner. Even if the cardholders holding coupons Nos.069527, 027501, 69517 and 012417 have not drawn rice, that by itself cannot and would not give rise to a presumption that the said rice was misused by the petitioner by diverting the same into black market. Respondent No.3 has not given a finding that though cardholders having the above mentioned coupons have not drawn rice, the petitioner made entries in the register showing that rice against those coupons was delivered to the coupon holders. In the absence of such an entry in the register, there is no warrant for respondent No.3 to straight away presume that the petitioner would have misused the rice, which was not drawn by the cardholders holding the said coupons. The mere fact that there were no closing balances on record in respect of the months of January to April, 2004, without finding any variation between the stock register and ground balance for those months, does not by itself justify respondent No.3 to come to the conclusion that because of non-closing of the balance stock in the registers, a quantity of 46 kgs of rice would have been diverted into the black market. When allegations are made against a person, the initial burden lies on the person, who makes such allegations. If once the initial burden is discharged, the onus shifts to the person against whom the allegations are made. Even if the strict rules of evidence cannot be applied as contended by the learned Government Pleader, the disciplinary authority is bound to support his conclusions on the basis of some relevant material, which justifies him to draw necessary presumptions. As discussed above in respect of the two charges, respondent No.3 failed to discuss any material whatsoever in drawing the presumption that the petitioner is guilty of the above mentioned two charges. Having carefully considered the reasoning given by respondent No.3 in his order of cancellation, I am of the view that he failed to advert to the basic material which warrants recording of findings against the petitioner and in the absence of any such material, respondent No.3 is not justified in concluding that the petitioner is guilty of charges 1 and 2. As regards charge No.3, it only relates to failure to exhibit the stock and price list, which the learned Government Pleader admits that it is trivial in nature and penalty of cancellation of dealership is not warranted. As regards charge No.4, namely, that the petitioner is not distributing the essential commodities to the cardholders, the finding is that some of the cardholders complained that the petitioner is not distributing the essential commodities properly to the cardholders and that the dealer distributes only on two or three days in a month and causing inconvenience to the cardholders. Here again, respondent No.3 has not referred to and discussed the names of the cardholders, who gave such complaints and the basis for the said complaints. Apart from the fact that the charge is too generic in nature, there is absolutely no material whatsoever discussed by respondent No.3 on the basis of which, he could come to the conclusion that the said charge is proved. Coming to the orders passed by respondent Nos.2 and 1 in the appeal and revision respectively, I do not find any independent reasons given by them to affirm the orders under appeal and revision respectively. Therefore, once the order of respondent No.3 cannot be sustained, the said orders cannot stand the scrutiny of the Court. The learned Government Pleader placed reliance on the judgment of this Court in Thamisetty Edukondalu v. Revenue Divisional Officer, Narasaraopet[1]. I have carefully gone through the said judgment, which turned on its own facts. While there can be no dispute about the legal proposition contained therein that this Court while exercising writ jurisdiction will not sit as appellate Court and re-appreciate evidence, this Court is certainly concerned with the decision making process. In B.Srinivasa Rao v. Andhra Bank [2] , while dealing with the scope of interference by the High Court in exercise of its writ jurisdiction in disciplinary cases, I held as under: “56. In Tata Cellular v. Union of India[3] the Supreme Court held that judicial review of an administrative action is concerned with the decision making process and not with the merits of the decision. Para- 77 of the judgment to the extent it is relevant is extracted herebelow: “Shortly put, the grounds upon which an administrative action is subject to control by judicial review can be classified as under: a. Illegality: This means the decision-maker must understand correctly the law that regulates his decision-making power and must give effect to it. b. Irrationality, namely, Wednesbury unreasonableness. c. Procedural impropriety.” 57. While explaining what Wednesbury principle means, the Supreme Court in para-80 held: “80. At this stage, the Supreme Court Practice, 1993, Vol.1, pp.849-850, may be quoted: “4. Wednesbury principle. A decision of a public authority will be liable to be quashed or otherwise dealt with by an appropriate order in judicial review proceedings where the Court concludes that the decision is such that no authority properly directing itself on the relevant law and acting reasonably could have reached it. (Associated Provincial Picture Houses Ltd. V. Wednesbury Corporation ((1980) 41 P&CR 255 per Lord Greene, M.R.)” 58. The Supreme Court in para-81 of the judgment explained the irrationality as under: “It is open to the court to review the decision-maker’s evaluation of the facts. The Court will intervene where the facts taken as a whole could not logically warrant the conclusion of the decision-maker. If the weight of facts pointing to one course of action is overwhelming, then a decision the other way, cannot be upheld. Thus, i n Emma Hotels Ltd. V. Secretary of State for Environment the Secretary of State referred to a number of factors which led him to the conclusion that a non-resident’s bar in a hotel was operated in such a way that the bar was not an incident of the hotel use for planning purposes, but constituted a separate use. The Divisional court analysed the factors which led the secretary of State to that conclusion and, having done so, set it aside. Donaldson, L.. said that he could not see on what basis the Secretary of State had reached his conclusion.” On a careful analysis of the entire case, I am of the firm view that the orders of the respondent are based on no evidence and suffer from irrationality. For the above-mentioned reasons, the writ petition is allowed. Orders, dated 04.05.2005, 22.09.2005 and 27.02.2007 of respondent Nos.3, 2 and 1 respectively are quashed. Consequently, the fair price shop authorization of the petitioner stands restored. This order does not preclude respondent No.3 from initiating proceedings afresh on the basis of the abovementioned charges and take appropriate action after giving reasonable opportunity to the petitioner in the light of the observations made hereinabove. It is also made clear that this order does not preclude the respondents from initiating proceedings as a consequence of orders passed under Section 6A of the Essential Commodities Act, 1955. C.V. NAGARJUNA REDDY, J 12th MARCH, 2008 kvni [1] 1999(5) ALT 600 [2] 2007(6) ALT 39 [3] (1994) 6 SCC 651