The Charge Memo based on an invalid order is unsustainable; therefore, the High Court under Article 226 is justified in quashing the Tribunal's directive for further inquiries.

ORDER :

B.M. SHYAM PRASAD, J.

The travails for the petitioner in his service with the Department of Forests has begun in the year 2015, and it has persisted with the Order dated 28.03.2024 in Application No.4597 of 2023 with the Karnataka State Administrative Tribunal, Bengaluru [for short, the Tribunal]. The petitioner's failure in his Application with the Tribunal affords him the cause to invoke this Court's jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution against the Tribunal's order.

2. The petitioner has invoked the Tribunal's jurisdiction under Section 19 of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985 [for short, the 1985 Act] to call in question the second respondent's order dated 21.09.2023 and the fourth respondent's notice dated 30.09.2023. The second respondent has directed further inquiry as contemplated under Rule 11A of the Karnataka Civil Service [Classification, Control and Appeal] Rules, 1957 [for short, the CCA Rules] and consequently the fourth respondent has issued a notice of hearing dated 30.09.2023.

3. The petitioner has reported to duty as the Deputy Range Forest Officer, Kaggalipura Range, Kaggalipura in January 2014, and on 08.06.2017, the petitioner is displaced with his posting to Madhugiri. The petitioner has called in question this order dated 08.06.2017 with the Tribunal in Application No. 3200/2017. The Tribunal has granted an interim order staying the order dated 08.06.2017. The petitioner is kept under suspension on 14.11.2018, and he continued under suspension until 08.04.2019 when this decision is revoked simultaneously with the decision to post him to the Research Range, Raichur.

4. The Tribunal has disposed of the petitioner's application in No. 3200/2017 in view of this Composite Order dated 08.04.2019 with liberty to the petitioner to call in question this Composite Order. The petitioner has filed his subsequent application in No. 3107/2019 with the Tribunal calling in question the Order dated 08.04.2019, and the Tribunal has disposed of this application by its Order dated 11.07.2019. The petitioner is served with Charge Memo dated 17.07.2019 [within a week] imputing that he, with no cause, had remained absent for duty between 08.04.2019 and 11.07.2019 [the period during which the petitioner’s application in No. 3107/2019 was pending]. The petitioner has responded to the second Show Cause Notice which is issued on completion of the enquiry, and the second respondent's order dated 21.09.2023 is after the petitioner's response to such second Show Cause Notice.

5. These circumstances are undisputed, and whether this Court must interfere with the Tribunal's order is considered in the light of the reasons offered by the Tribunal and the rival submissions. The Tribunal has opined that the petitioner's grievance stems from the assertion that the second respondent's order dated 21.09.2023 is an order that directs re-enquiry which is impermissible in law but the second respondent has only permitted a further enquiry from a particular stage as contemplated under Rule 11A of the CCA Rules.

6. Sri C.M. Nagabhushan, the learned Counsel for the petitioner, submits that the departmental proceedings against the petitioner [the inquiry] is essentially premised in the imputation that he has not reported to duty in terms of the Composite Order dated 08.04.2019 during the pendency of the Application No.3107/2019 - the application filed by the petitioner calling in question the order dated 08.04.2019, but the merits of this imputatio