JUDGMENT :

1. Rule. Rule made returnable forthwith and heard finally.

2. By this Petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, the Petitioner takes exception to the judgment and order dated 29th June, 2020, passed by the learned Presiding Officer, School Tribunal, Mumbai, in Appeal No. 28 of 2019, whereby and whereunder the Appeal preferred by the respondent No. 1 came to be allowed by setting aside the order of dismissal from service dated 14th September, 2019 with direction to reinstate the respondent No. 1 and pay backwages to the extent of 60%.

3. Shorn of superfluities, background facts necessary for the determination of this Petition can be stated as under:-

(a) Swati Education Trust, the petitioner, is a trust duly registered under the Maharashtra Public Trust Act, 1950. The petitioner - Trust runs, inter alia, Smt. J. B. Khot High School, a recognized school. The respondent No. 1 was appointed as an Assistant Teacher in the said school.

(b) Alleging that the respondent No. 1 was indulging in delinquent activities, during the period of 2016 and 2017, two separate memos were served on the respondent No. 1. By an order dated 7th February, 2017, respondent No. 1 was placed under suspension and chargesheet was served on the respondent No. 1. During the pendency of the inquiry, the suspension was revoked on 17th April, 2017.

(c) Post conclusion of inquiry, the Inquiry Committee submitted a report on 3rd June, 2019 and found respondent No. 1 guilty of insubordination and misconduct. Based on the findings recorded by the Inquiry Committee, by an order dated 14th September, 2019, a major penalty of dismissal from service was imposed upon the respondent No. 1.

(d) Being aggrieved, the respondent No. 1 preferred an Appeal under Section 9 of the Maharashtra Employees of Private Schools (Conditions of Service) Regulation Act, 1977 (“the MEPS Act”).

(e) The learned Presiding Officer, School Tribunal, after appraisal of the material on record and the submissions canvassed before him, was persuaded to hold that the inquiry was not fair, legal and proper. The findings recorded by the Inquiry Committee were perverse and the penalty inflicted upon the respondent No. 1 was also shockingly disproportionate. Thus by the impugned judgment and order, the School Tribunal quashed and set aside the order of dismissal and directed the reinstatement of the respondent No. 1 in service with 60% back wages.

4. Being aggrieved by and dissatisfied with the impugned judgment and order, the petitioner - Trust has invoked the Writ jurisdiction of this Court.

5. I have heard Mr. Pankaj M. Patel, the learned Counsel for the petitioner and Mr. B. S. Nayak, the learned Counsel for respondent No. 1. With the assistance of the learned Counsel for the parties, I have perused the material on record and the relevant documents.

6. Mr. Patel mounted a two-fold challenge to the impugned judgment. Firstly, when the School Tribunal came to a finding that the inquiry was vitiated on account of failure to comply with the prescription contained in Rule 33 to 37 of the Maharashtra Employees of Private Schools (Conditions of Service) Rule, 1981 (“the MEPS Rules”), it was incumbent upon the School Tribunal to either provide an opportunity to the petitioner to hold a fresh inquiry or itself hold an inquiry by providing an opportunity to the petitioner to adduce evidence before the School Tribunal.

7. Secondly, the School Tribunal, according Mr. Patel, committed a grave error in law in awarding 60% back wages in the absence of pleading and proof on the part of respondent No.1 - employee that, in the intervening period, the respondent No. 1 was not gainfully employed. Mr. Patel would urge that what accentuates the situation in the instant case is that the School Tribunal was fully alive to the proposition of law that it was for the employee to plead that she was not gainfully employed and no affidavit that the respondent No. 1 had not been gainfully employed was placed on record