IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) MONDAY, THE ELEVENTH DAY OF AUGUST, TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE GHULAM MOHAMMED and THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE C.V.RAMULU WRIT PETITION NO : 25182 of 2005 Between: 1 The Union of India, Rep by its Secretary Ministry of Defence Government of India New Delhi. 2 The Chief of the Naval Staff, Naval Headquarters, New Delhi . ..... PETITIONER(S) AND Dr. GV Satyanarayana Rao, S/o. Late Gunturi Ramaiah, Naval Dockyard, Visakhapatnam. .....RESPONDENT Petition under Article 226 of the constitution of India praying that in the circumstances stated in the Aﬃdavit ﬁled herein the High Court will be pleased to to issue preferably a writ in the nature of certiorari or any appropriate writ, order or direction, calling for the records pertaining to OA No. 1364 of 2001 dated 10-6-2005 on the ﬁle of Central Administrative Tribunal, Hyderabad Bench, and quash the same and declare the same as illegal, arbitrary, contrary to law and unconstitutional, declare the same as void ab-inito, null and void and or pass such further or other order or orders as this Hon'ble Court may deem fit proper in the facts and circumstances of the case Counsel for the Petitioner:MR.A.RAJASHEKAR REDDY (ASST SOLICITOR GEN) Counsel for the Respondent No.: MRS.ANITA SWAIN The Court made the following : THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE GHULAM MOHAMMED and THE HON'BLE MR JUSTICE C.V.RAMULU W.P.No.25182 of 2005 ORDER: (per GHULAM MOHAMMED, J) This writ petition is ﬁled seeking to quash the orders dated 10-06-2005 in O.A.No.1364 of 2001 on the ﬁle of the Central Administrative Tribunal, Hyderabad (for short “the Tribunal”) by virtue of which the Tribunal set-aside the orders of the ﬁrst petitioner dated 02-08-2000, wherein the respondent was imposed with punishment of reduction of pay by two stages with cumulative effect, and allowed the O.A. 2. The details relevant and necessary for deciding the writ petition, are that the respondent joined Government of India service in the month of May,1980 in Census Department and in the month of November,1981 came as Senior Hindi Translator to the oﬃce of Head quarters, Eastern Naval Command, Visakhapatnam. In the month of May, 1985, he was promoted as Translation Oﬃcer (H/E), Headquarter, ENC-5. While he was so working, he received a charge Memo N. CE/9103/16 dated 18.8.1990 from Vice Admiral, Flag Oﬃcer Commander-in-Chief, Visakhapatnam, for which he submitted explanation on 20.9.1990 denying the charges. On receipt of explanation, the Vice Admiral Flag Oﬃcer Commanding-in-Chief, Visakhapatnam, appointed one Mr.R.K.Iyer, the Base Logistics Oﬃcer, Visakhapatnam, as Inquiry Oﬃcer by proceedings dated 11.2.1991. Subsequently, Mr.R.K.Iyer, who was appointed as inquiry oﬃcer, was replaced by Sri Ijwinder Singh, the Deputy General Manager, Naval Armament Depot, Visakhapatnam. After the inquiry proceedings, the presenting oﬃcer had submitted his brief, so also the defence brief was submitted on behalf of the respondent. The Vice Admiral-Flag Oﬃcer Commanding-in-Chief, Visakhapatnam, sent a memo dated 8.10.1992 enclosing a copy of the inquiry report where under it was found that all the charges levelled against the respondent were proved and directed the respondent to submit his representation or submission, if any, to the disciplinary authority within 15 days of the receipt of the said memo. The respondent had submitted his representation on 29.10.1992 objecting the ﬁndings arrived at by the Inquiry Officer. On 21.6.1993, the Vice Admiral, Chief of Personnel, New Delhi, passed an order conﬁrming the ﬁndings of the Inquiry Oﬃcer in respect of Articles 1, IV, and V of the charge sheet and as far as the Articles II and III of the charge sheet were concerned, they were found not proved and awarded the punishment of reduction of pay by two stages for a period of one year with further directions that he would not earn increments of pay during the period of reduction, which would have the eﬀect of postponing his future increment of pay and the same was communicated by an order dated 6.7.1993 to the respondent. Aggrieved by the order of awarding punishment, the respondent ﬁled an appeal before the Chief of Naval Staﬀ, Naval Headquarters, New Delhi, on 20.08.1993. By order dated 29.10.1993, the respondent was advised that the appeal lies to the Government of India. Meanwhile, the respondent addressed a letter dated 4.1.1994 to the Hon’ble President of India, seeking a clariﬁcation in respect of certain doubts and by letter dated 28.2.1994 the respondent was informed by the Assistant Director of Civilian Person (D & V), New Delhi, that an appeal lies against the penalty imposed by the Chief of Personnel to the President of India. The respondent has got issued a notice through his Advocate on 14.9.1994 to the Secretary, Ministry of Defence, New Delhi, the Chief of Naval Staﬀ, Naval Headquarters, New Delhi and the Chief Personnel, Naval Headquarters, New Delhi, asking them to quash the major punishment awarded by the incompetent authority and to do justice to him. Thereafter, the ﬁrst petitioner had passed an order dated 16.9.1997 setting aside the impugned penalty order therein dated 21-6-1993 issued by the Chief of Personnel, Naval Headquarters and remitted the matter to the competent disciplinary authority i.e. second petitioner-Chief of Naval Staﬀ-second petitioner, for examination/ﬁnalization of the matter on merits i.e. from the stage of submission of defence statement on the inquiry by the respondent. Accordingly, the second petitioner passed an order dated 21.8.1998 awarding the same punishment as was passed by the Chief of Personnel, Naval Headquarters, New Delhi. Aggrieved by the same, the respondent ﬁled O.A.No.1256 of 1998 before the Tribunal and the same was disposed of by order dated 7.9.1999 holding that an appeal lies against the order dated 21.8.1998. Then, the respondent ﬁled his appeal and the appellate authority by order dated 2.8.2000, had rejected the appeal ﬁled by the respondent. Aggrieved by the order of the ﬁrst petitioner dated 2-8-2008 dismissing the appeal by conﬁrming the order of the second petitioner dated 21.8.1998, the respondent approached the Tribunal. 3. In view of the orders dated 16.9.1997 of the ﬁrst petitioner that the second petitioner-Chief of Naval Staﬀ alone should act as disciplinary authority in the case of the respondent and not the Flag Oﬃcer Commanding-in-Chief of Eastern Command and setting-aside the impugned penalty order dated 21.6.1993 of the Chief Personnel, Naval Headquarters and remitting the matter to the competent disciplinary authority i.e. the second petitioner- Chief of Naval Staﬀ- second petitioner, the Tribunal held that when the disciplinary authority has been declared as incompetent, it would have no jurisdiction to appoint an inquiry oﬃcer and therefore, the Tribunal quashed the entire proceedings in the matter and further observed that there was abnormal delay in ﬁnalization of the matter and the respondent has been put to harassment since a very long time. 4. The learned Standing counsel for the petitioners contended that even though the initiation of the disciplinary proceedings is by some other oﬃcer, it cannot be said that he is incompetent disciplinary authority and the ﬁrst petitioner set-aside the penalty order issued by the Chief of Personnel, Naval Headquarters, New Delhi, purely on technical grounds since the order appointing the respondent was signed for Chief of the Naval Staﬀ. He also contended that the appointing authority of the respondent as well as all Group B oﬃcers in Navy is Chief of Personnel and he prays to set-aside the impugned order dated 10-06-2005 passed by the Tribunal. 5. Heard the learned Assistant Solicitor General of India and the learned counsel for the respondent. 6. We have perused the charges framed, the misconduct alleged against the respondent and the punishment imposed on him. It appears that the charges framed against the respondent are trivial in nature and the punishment imposed is a major one. Though the charges are trivial in nature, it cannot be said that the punishment imposed on the respondent is illegal. However, in the facts and circumstances, we are of the opinion that imposing the punishment of reduction by two stages with cumulative eﬀect is disproportionate to that of the misconduct alleged. Therefore, we consider that the punishment imposed shall be modiﬁed to that of stoppage of two increments without cumulative eﬀect. Accordingly, we direct the writ petitioners to impose modiﬁed punishment of reduction of pay by two stages without cumulative eﬀect on the respondent. Respondent shall be paid all the benefits accrued to his credit thereof. 7. The writ petition, is accordingly, disposed of. No order as to costs. ​ ________​______________ GHULAM MOHAMMED,J ____________ C.V.RAMULU,J 11-08-2008 Stp