1 D.B.Civil Special Appeal(Writ) No.1874/2008 Neenu Tripathi V/s The State of Raj. & ors. 17.11.2008 Hon'ble the Chief Justice Mr.Narayan Roy Hon'ble Mr.Justice Mohammad Rafiq Mr.Sajid Ali for the appellant. This appeal is directed against the judgment of the learned Single Judge of this Court dated 7th March, 2006 whereby the writ application of the petitioner- appellant challenging the order of penalty dated 23rd October, 1998 and subsequent orders dated 17.4.2002 dismissing the appeal and dated 14.2.2005 dismissing review application, was dismissed. Learned counsel for the petitioner has argued that the order of penalty was not conveyed to her in time and that is why she could not file appeal in time and had she been served with the copy of the order of penalty, she would have preferred the appeal in time. She came to know about the passing of the order of penalty only when the order dated 6th January, 1999 was passed regularizing the period of her absence of 164 days by granting extraordinary leave without salary. Learned counsel further argued that the order of penalty would adversely affect her service career and thus, when leave period was already regularized, imposition of penalty of stoppage of one annual grade increment without cumulative effect was not justified. It was further argued that the appeal as well as review application were dismissed without application of mind because they were filed delayed and reason for that was that the penalty order was supplied 2 belatedly. Having heard learned counsel for the appellant and perused the impugned order, we find that the charge of absence from duty for 164 days was found proved against the petitioner-appellant and the disciplinary authority, on the basis of the evidence, came to the conclusion that the appellant-petitioner was guilty for wilful absence from duty from 13.7.1992 to 23.12.1992. The penalty of stoppage of one annual grade increment and that too without cumulative effect imposed upon the writ-petitioner-appellant cannot be said to be unjustified. At the same time, the aforesaid period of absence was directed to be regularized by grant of extraordinary leave without salary. The subsequent order dated 6th January, 1999 is only a consequential order passed with a view to regularizing the period of absence from duty and on that basis, it cannot be argued that the misconduct of the petitioner-appellant stood condoned or that it would amount to double jeopardize. We therefore do not find any merit in this appeal. It is accordingly dismissed. (Mohammad Rafiq)J. (Narayan Roy)C.J. Parmar