( 1 ) LEAVE granted.

( 2 ) THIS appeal is directed against the order dated 30/04/1993 of the Madhya Pradesh Administrative Tribunal (Indore Bench)in the Transfer Application No. 3551 of 1988. By the impugned order the Tribunal has held that the departmental enquiry against the respondent was instituted without a proper and valid sanction as contemplated by Rule 9 (2) (b) (i) and (ii) of the Madhya Pradesh Civil Services Pension Rules, 1979 (hereinafter as pension Rules)and as such it is not sustainable and deserves to be quashed. Being aggrieved by the aforesaid order of the Tribunal the State of Madhya Pradesh has approached this Court.

( 3 ) THE respondent had retired from the post of Director Institute of Animal Health and Veterinary Biological Products, Mhow on 31/07/1983. His retiral benefits had been sanctioned by the appropriate authority. At that point of time gross financial irregularities having come to the notice of the Secretary to the Government of Madhya Pradesh. Department of Animal and Cattle Wealth during the period while the respondent was continuing in the post of Director, Institute of Animal Health and Veterinary Biological Products from 1977 onwards, a letter was issued to the said respondent proposing an enquiry against him on 6/04/1985. Thereafter a charge sheet was served upon the respondent on 2/04/1986 and a departmental enquiry was ordered against him. The appropriate authority further withheld 50 per cent of his pension and a part of the gratuity amount of the respondent. The respondent being aggrieved by the said order moved the High Court of Madhya Pradesh for quashing the aforesaid enquiry as well as for quashing the order of withholding a part of the pension and gratuity, interalia on the ground that without the sanction of the Governor as contemplated under Rule 9 (2) (b) (i) of the pension Rules, the proceeding is vitiated and also the consequential order withholding a part of the pension and gratuity. During the pendency of the application before the Madhya Pradesh High Court, the State Tribunal having been constituted the proceeding was transferred to the Administrative Tribunal and the Tribunal finally disposed of the matter.

( 4 ) IN the return filed by the State and its officers it was contended that the respondent had committed grave financial irregularities during his tenure relating to period of 1977 onwards. The said financial irregularities came to the notice of appropriate authority after the pension case of the respondent was forwarded by the Director of Veterinary Services. In fact the respondent before his superannuation got the no demand and no enquiry certificate issued in his favour on mis-representation of facts. When the financial irregularities and embezzlement committed by the respondent came to the notice of the appropriate authority, as a result of investigation started by the Economic Wing of the Police, the appropriate authority took the decision to initiate the departmental proceeding. Before initiation of departmental proceedings against the respondent under the provision of Pension Rules of 1976, due sanction of the Council of Ministers had been obtained and the order in question was communicated to the respondent by a duly authenticated order purported to have been passed by order of the Governor of Masdhya Pradesh. The order in question though had been signed by the under secretary to the Government of Madhya Pradesh, Department of Animal Husbandry, but its has been clearly stated.

( 5 ) THE Tribunal on examining the provisions of Pension Rules more particularly Rule 9 (2) (b) (i),came to the conclusion that the sanction of the Governor himself is necessary and therefore departmental proceedings could not be initiated under the orders of the Council of Ministers. Accordingly, the Tribunal quashed the departmental proceedings initiated against the respondent and also the order withholding a part of the pension and gratuity of the respondent.

( 6 ) MR. Chitale, lea