IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE AT PATNA CWJC No.5477 of 2006 PRAMOD KUMAR YADAV Versus THE UNION OF INDIA & ORS ----------- 3 6.8.2008 Heard learned counsel for the parties. Petitioner has been removed from service by the respondent CRPF after holding a departmental enquiry on the charge that he entered into matrimony a second time over during the subsistence of the first marriage and life time of the first wife. The allegation was that the petitioner married one Sunita Devi in the year, 1987, even had a female child out of the said wedding. Subsequently on 1.11.1988 petitioner married Parmila Devi, the fact not denied by him though he did try to urge before the authority that his first marriage is with Parmila Devi and marriage to Sunita Devi was a forced marriage against his consent and will, therefore he cannot be held guilty for the so called marriage in question. The above defence of the petitioner had many a holes. The finding in the enquiry is otherwise. The matrimony entered by petitioner second time over was by free will but even if the first marriage was a forced one that continued to be a valid marriage till dissolved by a declaration by a court of competent jurisdiction. The enquiry had been started on a complaint made by Sunita Devi who had produced enough evidence to set the law in motion. Findings are against the petitioner and based on the findings the disciplinary authority thereafter has imposed - 2 - punishment on the petitioner for his removal from service. The appellate authority as well the revisional authority in view of the preponderance of evidence affirmed the punishment order. Even today the petitioner is not in a position to demonstrate to the Court that he has managed to earn a dissolution of the first marriage through a court of law. If it was so the Court could have taken a lenient view and may be asked the respondents to reconsider the matter afresh. But law being what it is and two marriages subsisting as of today, there is no scope for the petitioner to escape from the liability of two marriages. The Court finds no merit. This writ application is dismissed. RPS (Ajay Kumar Tripathi,J.)