IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA Letters Patent Appeal No.992 of 2010 In (CIVIL WRIT JURISDICTION CASE 17728/2009). 1. The State Of Bihar Through Commercial Taxes Commissioner, Govt. Of Bihar, Old Secretariat, Patna 2. The Commercial Taxes Commissioner-Cum-Principal Secretary, Department Of Commercial Taxes, Govt. Of Bihar, Patna 3. Assistant Commissioner, Commercial Taxes-Cum-Circle Incharge, Department Of Commercial Taxes, Bhabhua Circle, Bhabhua, Bihar ..Appellants. Versus 1. Aditya Narayan S/O Late Kailashpati Narayan R/O Shivpur, Mahendru, P.S. Sultanganj, Distt. And Town Patna ….. Respondents. ---------------------------------- 5. 22.12.2011 Heard learned counsel for the appellant-State and the learned counsel for the writ petitioner. By the order under appeal, the writ Court has set aside the order awarding minor punishment of censure to the writ-petitioner/respondent and has remanded the matter to the competent authority to proceed afresh from the stage the petitioner submitted his reply to the show cause notice. Learned counsel for the appellants submitted that the impugned order of censure was passed in the case of several other Officers also and the orders were similarly worded and in some cases, this Court did not interfere with the order of censure because of availability of remedy of review which has been availed by preferring review application. But it is fairly admitted that such orders were 2 not produced before the writ Court as no counter affidavit was filed. Further submission on behalf of appellants is that the order of punishment is not perverse because of clear indication that the punishment was imposed for not meeting the target of tax collection and the order further mentions that the show cause submitted by the Officer has been examined before passing the order of censure. No doubt, the law is well settled that in a matter relating to award of minor punishment only requirement of law is to grant opportunity of filing show cause but the purpose of grating such opportunity is to create an obligation upon the disciplinary authority to apply its mind to the facts of the case. Only a blanket mention that the show cause has been considered has not been found sufficient. In the present case. In our view the order of the writ Court does not require any interference. We have no hesitation in observing that after the remand, the disciplinary authority will not be required to pass elaborate judgment but is required only to indicate in brief the reasons for not accepting the show cause, if it decides to do so. We have heard the parties on the issue of 3 limitation and in the present case, the delay of 52 days in filing of the appeal is condoned. The limitation petition stands allowed. The appeal is dismissed with the aforesaid observations. Jay/ (Shiva Kirti Singh,J) (Shivaji Pandey, J)