Disciplinary action against employees in banking must balance serious misconduct with fair treatment principles, allowing for reconsideration of penalties based on prior service and comparative cases.

ORDER :

1. The petitioner is before this Court calling in question an order of the disciplinary authority imposing a penalty of dismissal from service, the order of the appellate authority affirming the said order of dismissal and the order of the reviewing authority affirming both the orders or refusing to review the orders passed by both the authorities. All of which are under challenge. Therefore, the petitioner is dismissed from service on account of certain allegations levelled against him.

2. Heard Shri Mallikarjunswamy B.Hiremath, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner and Shri Narayan V.Yaji, learned counsel appearing for respondents.

3. Facts adumbrated are as follows:

The petitioner is appointed as a Clerk cum Cashier in Union Bank of India on 07.12.1989 and at the relevant point in time the petitioner was working as an Accountant, which was with effect from 25.09.2009. Certain allegations crop-up against the petitioner of certain serious misconduct or misappropriation as the case would be on a complaint by a customer. Out of the allegations, two proceedings spring. One, the Criminal Law being set into motion and the other, a departmental inquiry. In the departmental inquiry, the reply submitted by the petitioner to the charge sheet, having found unsatisfactory, the enquiry officer is appointed to enquire into the allegations. The enquiry officer holds the petitioner guilty of the allegations.

4. On the consideration of the findings of the enquiry officer and the reply submitted by the petitioner, the disciplinary authority imposes a penalty of dismissal from service. The petitioner approaches the appellate authority as obtaining under Regulation 17 of the Banking Regulations and seeks reversal of the order of dismissal. The appellate authority affirms the said order. The petitioner then prefers a review under Regulation 18 of the Banking Regulations, which also comes to be rejected. The petitioner is before the Court as observed herein above calling in question all the aforesaid orders. The contemporaneous development that takes place is that the criminal law that was set into motion against the petitioner ends in his acquittal albeit on rendering benefit of doubt. The acquittal of the petitioner is said to have become final.

5. Learned counsel appearing for the petitioner submits that a complaint is registered against the petitioner, the accountant and the manager. The two are charged similarly. The petitioner is chosen for extreme penalty of dismissal from service while the manager, who is also charged with similar allegations, is imposed penalty of reduction in time scale by two stages. The learned counsel submits that it is discriminatory. Further, the learned counsel submits that the criminal case that was registered on the same set of facts has ended in acquittal and the acquittal has become final. Therefore, on all these circumstances the learned counsel submits that the order of penalty or the order of the appellate authority must be set aside and the petitioner must be directed re-instatement. More so in the light of the fact that the complainant himself later gives a letter that he has used the amount and it is not misused by the petitioner. On all the aforesaid score, he seeks that the petition be allowed.

6. Per contra, the learned counsel Shri Narayan V.Yaji appearing for the respondent Bank would vehemently refute the submission in contending that the petitioner is guilty of misappropriation of funds not only on the complaint, but there are several other allegations. He would take this Court through the findings of the enquiry officer and the order of