IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.5615 of 1989 Date of decision: 22.03.2010 Rajbir Singh Tomer ….Petitioner versus Haryana Seeds Development Corporation Limited …Respondent CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN ------ Present: Mr. A.K. Bura, Advocate, for the petitioner. None for the respondent. ----- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment? 2. To be referred to the reporters or not? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest? ----- K.Kannan, J 1. The termination order had been issued against the petitioner on 20.04.1989 for alleged proof of two charges namely, (i) alleged receipt of Rs.3,000/- from one P.P.S.Lamba as advance money for reservation of wheat seed in September, 1985 and retention of the same without depositing the money with the Regional Office; and (ii) engineering of false complaint against a superior officer Shri M.S.Chauhan that he had received Rs.8,000/- from a grower and that he did not deposit the said amount with HSDC, Umri, by falsely creating evidence as though that the petitioner himself visited the grower and recovered the money. In the enquiry constituted against the petitioner, Civil Writ Petition No.5615 of 1989 - 2 - evidence had been let in to the effect that the amount had been paid by Shri Lamba to the petitioner and his evidence was corroborated by the statement of the driver Shri Chander Singh. Yet another witness by name C.P.Sachdev had given a statement that he was present at the time when the disputed payment was made. The fact of receipt of the amount from Lamba was denied by the petitioner and defied Lamba to state on oath that he had made such a payment to him, who, according to Shri Chander Singh swore immediately to such an effect. Shri Sachdev had not been cross-examined by the petitioner and Shri Lamba's statement was substantiated also by the production of a letter given to J.L.Sah, a Production Manager, to whom he had given in writing the entire sequence of events. Yet another witness Shri Tyagi was brought out before the Enquiry Officer to prove that the petitioner had undertaken to return the money to Lamba if the latter swore that he had actually paid the amount to the petitioner and that he knew that Shri Lamba had sworn before them that he had indeed made the payment to the petitioner. 2. As regards the 2nd charge that he had engineered the complaint against a superior officer Mr. M.S.Chauhan that he had received Rs.8,000/- from grower and did not deposit the amount with HSDC, Umri, the Presenting Officer cross-examined Dharam Singh as regards the alleged payment made to Chauhan when a contradiction was brought out through the statement of Dharam Singh that he had already paid about Rs.6,000/- to the petitioner when the latter visited the village and collected the money. When asked to explain what action he had taken against Mr. Chauhan, the witness had stated that he had actually Civil Writ Petition No.5615 of 1989 - 3 - visited him at his residential quarter at one time and at another time, he was not able to recall when he visited him. The Enquiry Officer also took notice of the fact that the grower did not obtain any receipt from Mr.Chauhan when he delivered the amount to him. The petitioner himself was reported to have given a statement to the Corporation that no action need be taken against the grower for non-payment by institution of a civil suit and that he would secure the amount back from the grower. The Enquiry Officer found that for an amount which the petitioner himself had received, he had falsely implicated Mr. Chauhan and he had also wrongly tutored the grower to give evidence against the superior officer at the enquiry. The Enquiry Officer found a fundamental flaw in the entire episode as narrated by the petitioner from the fact that Mr. Chauhan himself was not working as Regional Manager at the relevant time in December 1986 when the incident was reported to have taken place. Both the charges were serious enough and if the truth of the charges had been made, the punishment or removal from service was proportionate to the gravity of the charges. 3. The finding regarding the guilt is based on factual consideration by the Enquiry Officer on whose report, the petitioner had been dismissed from service and intra-departmental appeal also failed. This Court cannot treat itself as a court of appeal and the scope of enquiry before this Court cannot traverse beyond finding whether there had been any gross injustice meted out to the petitioner by not following the principles of natural justice or if there was completely a lack of evidence to substantiate the findings and punishment. The Civil Writ Petition No.5615 of 1989 - 4 - proportionately of punishment itself cannot also be challenged unless it is capricious and arbitrary. 4. Both as regards the finding of guilt and the punishment, the disciplinary authority has not been shown to have erred and there is no scope for intervention in the writ petition. The writ petition accordingly fails and is dismissed. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 22.03.2010 sanjeev