IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI Date of decision : January 25th , 2008 WP(C) No.449/2008 # Tarun Kumar ….… Petitioner ! Through: Mr.Varun Prasad, Advocate. Versus $ Delhi Golf Club Ltd. ......... Respondent ^ Through: Nemo. CORAM :- * HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE ANIL KUMAR 1. Whether reporters of Local papers may YES be allowed to see the judgment? 2. To be referred to the reporter or not? NO 3. Whether the judgment should be reported NO in the Digest? ANIL KUMAR, J. (Oral) * 1. The petitioner has impugned the order dated 16th November, 2006 of Labour Court XVIII dismissing the challenge to the inquiry and upholding the same and holding that the termination of the petitioner with effect from 28th September, 1998 is legal and the inquiry conducted was fair and proper and in accordance with principle of natural justice. 2. The grievance of the petitioner is that he could not be subject to a second inquiry on the same charge and the inquiry was conducted by an advocate who was not a member of the Club and consequently WP(C) No.449/2008 Page 1 of 4 the same was against the principle of natural justice and, therefore, his termination was illegal and he sought reinstatement with full back wages. 3. The Labor Court has noticed that an inquiry was conducted by Shri B.M.Kapoor in which the petitioner and one Shri Satte Singh were co-delinquent. The Labour Court considered the rules for inquiry and inferred that there was no rule debarring the Management from getting an inquiry conducted by an outsider. It was also noticed that requirement was that the Inquiry Officer should be an independent and unbiased person and should have a valid authority from the employer. Since there was no allegation against the Inquiry Officer that as an Advocate he represented the Management in any of the cases, it was held that he did not have any bias and the contention of the petitioner was rejected. 4. The plea of the petitioner that he could not be subject to two inquiries has also been negated as the first inquiry was just a preliminary inquiry and conducted by Shri K.S. Mittal, Financial Controller and on the basis of that the full inquiry was conducted under Clause 23.4, 23.21 and 23.41 of the Service Rules. The substance of the charge against the workman is that he connived with two employees of M/s.Kallu & Co., suppliers of Chicken & Broilers and manipulated the accounts of the Management to show receipt of WP(C) No.449/2008 Page 2 of 4 more quantity of material than actually received thereby leading to inflated bills and loss to the Management. It was noticed that the role of Shri Satte Singh was to approve the bills which were put before him as the Assistant Manager (Stores) and such bills were to be counter- signed by Shri Satte Singh. Since Shri Satte Singh admitted that he was gross negligent in not verifying the bills himself and did not conduct the periodic counter checks to detect the bungling, it was inferred that guilt against the petitioner was different. The charges against the petitioner were also inferred on the basis of statements of two employees of the supplier, namely, Mohd. Yakub and Mohd. Ahmed. The Labour Court has thus held that even if the deposition of Shri Satte Singh is not used against him, there were sufficient independent evidence to prove the charges against the petitioner. 5. It is a settled position of law that in exercise of jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, this Court is not to interfere with factual findings of the lower courts nor will re- appreciate the evidence while exercising powers of judicial review. Reliance for this proposition can be placed on the judgment of the Supreme Court, Government of A.P. and Ors. v. Mohd. Nasrullah Khan reported as (2006) 2 SCC 373. It was held that the writ court should refrain from interfering with the orders of an inferior tribunal or subordinate court unless it suffers from an error of jurisdiction or from a breach of the principles of natural justice or is vitiated by a WP(C) No.449/2008 Page 3 of 4 manifest or apparent error of law. The objective of judicial review is that a person receives a fair treatment and objective is not to re- appreciate the entire pleas and evidence and draw inferences again. Judicial review is not an appeal from a decision but a review of the manner in which the decision is made. Power of judicial review is meant to ensure that the individual receives fair treatment and not to ensure that the conclusion which the authority reaches is necessarily correct in the eye of the court. 6. In the facts and circumstances, there is no perversity or manifest error or denial of principle of natural justice while passing the order dated 16th November, 2006 so as to entail inference by this Court under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The writ petition in the facts and circumstances is without any merit and is, therefore, dismissed. January 25th, 2008. ANIL KUMAR, J. 'Dev' WP(C) No.449/2008 Page 4 of 4