The judgment establishes the principle that truthfully declaring information and the employer's discretion in considering the suppression of facts are crucial in employment matters.

JUDGMENT :

R.N. LADDHA, J.

1. Heard learned Counsel for the parties.

2. Rule. The rule is made returnable forthwith with the consent of and at the request of the learned Counsel for the parties.

3. This Petition is directed against the order dated 20th March 2020 passed by the Chief Administrative Officer (P) of the Respondent organisation-Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Mumbai, rejecting the representation dated 23rd December 2019 made by the Petitioner, alongwith the termination letter dated 27th February 2018.

4. The brief facts of the case that come out of the record are that in 2016, the Respondent organization-Bhabha Atomic Research Centre invited applications from the eligible candidates for filling up the post of Hospital Work Assistant. The Petitioner had applied and was selected by the Respondents for the post. Before appointing the Petitioner, he was required to declare whether he had ever been arrested, prosecuted or detained. He was also asked to state whether he had been charged with an offence before a Court for which he was convicted, conditionally discharged, placed on probation or acquitted. He answered all of them in the negative. The disclosure of these facts in the attestation form is an essential requirement. The attestation form itself contends a clause that any false declaration may lead to cancellation of candidature.

5. The accepted position, though, is that Crime No. 189/2012 was registered against the Petitioner before the concerned police station alleging offences punishable under Sections 323, 324, 504 read with Section 34 of the IPC and that at the time of attestation form was filled, he was facing a criminal case that he did not disclose. The Respondents, having come to know about the same, issued a show-cause notice dated 25th October 2016 as to why his candidature should not be cancelled for suppression of such material information. According to the Petitioner, he did not disclose that there was a criminal matter pending because he had not committed any offence and that he was acquitted, too. The Respondents did not accept the explanation but instead cancelled his candidature by communication dated 27th February 2018, based on suppression of material information.

6. The Petitioner thereupon filed Original Application No. 382/2018 and challenged the said action of the Respondents before the Central Administrative Tribunal. The Tribunal, by impugned judgment, dismissed the said application. The Petitioner, aggrieved, filed Writ Petition No. 2923/2018 before the High Court. The High Court, however, dismissed the Writ Petition by its order dated 24th July 2019. The Petitioner challenged the decision of the High Court by filing Special Leave Petition No. 24504/2019 before the Hon’ble Supreme Court. The Hon’ble Supreme Court, by its order dated 21st October 2019, disposed of the SLP, however, it granted liberty to the Petitioner to make representation based on the decision in Avtar Singh vs. Union of India and Others, (2016) 8 SCC 471 to the concerned authority. Under the liberty granted by the Hon’ble Supreme Court, the Petitioner had made representation to the second Respondent. The said representation, however, came to be rejected. That became the subject matter of challenge of this writ petition.

7. Learned Counsel for the Petitioner submitted that the Petitioner had no intention to suppress any information from the Respondent authority and non-disclosure of pendency of criminal case was the bona-fide mistake of the Petitioner. Mere involvement in some petty cases would not render a person unsuitable for the job. The learned Counsel further submitted that in any case, the Petitioner was acquitted by Judgment dated 8th June 2016. In his view, the representations made by the Petitioner have not been considered in light of the judgment of the Apex Court in the case of Avtar Singh (supra). The learned Counsel relied on the decision of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Pawan Kumar vs. Union of India and Another, 2