Whether in the facts compulsory retirement of petitioner justified?

Mohit S. Shah, J.—This petition under Article 226 of the Constitution is directed against the High Court order dated 27.04.2005 and the Government notification dated 16.08.2005 compulsorily retiring the petitioner, a judicial officer holding the post of Civil Judge(SD) and Judicial Magistrate First Class, from service after a disciplinary inquiry.

2. The facts leading to filing of this petition, briefly stated, are as under :—

2.1 The petitioner who was born on 07.05.1955, joined judicial service on 09.11.1981. After his appointment to the post of Civil Judge(JD) and JMFC, the petitioner was posted at Navsari and was thereafter transferred to different places, such as Pardi, Valsad, Devdhar, Bharuch, Savli, Visnagar and Baroda. The petitioner was thereafter promoted to the post of Civil Judge(SD) on 10.06.1996 and was posted at Amreli.

2.2 The petitioner was placed under suspension by order dated 16.12.1997(which order was implemented on 17.12.1997) in view of the contemplated departmental inquiry on the basis of allegations made against the petitioner that during his tenure as Civil Judge(JD) and JMFC, Visnagar between 15.06.1992 and 12.06.1994, the petitioner had granted bail orders in seven cases where the offences were punishable with life imprisonment being offences punishable under Section 307, IPC. The petitioner was thereafter served with chargesheet dated 03.08.1998, levelling in all 17 charges including charge Nos. 4 and 6 which read as under :—

(IV) In seven criminal cases(numbers given)

“the accused persons were arrested and produced before you for a serious offence punishable under Section 307 of Indian Penal Code for which punishment provided is imprisonment for life and fine and though you were very well aware that cases under Section 307 of IPC are exclusively triabe by the Court of Sessions, and Judicial Magistrate has no jurisdiction to grant bail, you, after accepting huge amounts released the accused persons on bail, in the said matters, holding that there was no prima facie case against the said accused for the offence punishable under Sec. 307 of IPC.

(VI) In Regular Civil Suit No. 56/94 filed by Sumitraben Rameshchandra on 27.05.94, against Naranbhai Prahladbhai Patel & Others, for permanent injunction, you granted ex parte injunction against the defendant, but on the next day, i.e. on 28.05.94, on the application of the defendant and without giving opportunity of being heard to the plaintiff as provided in Rule 4 of Order 39 of Civil Procedure Code, you, with an oblique motive, modified the said ex parte order and directed both the parties to maintain status quo and because of the same the defendants took the benefit of putting up a door in the wall adjoining the disputed land and continued the said door under order of status quo.”

Seven other charges also pertained to judicial orders passed by the petitioner as Civil Judge(JD) and JMFC at Viramgam. Charge Nos. 10 to 13 pertained to the petitioner’s conduct at Viramgam regarding the petitioner’s dress habits, use of unparliamentary language on dias and maintaining relations with an advocate and with an accused.

2.3 The petitioner submitted his reply to the chargesheet and denied the same. It was also contended that no departmental inquiry could be held in relation to the judicial orders passed by the petitioner which were never challenged by any party and which were not interfered with by any appellate or revisional Court.

2.4 After considering the evidence on record, the Inquiry Officer, a Judge of the City Civil Court, Ahmedabad submitted report dated 22.01.2001(Annexure-G pages 151 to 219). The findings of the Inquiry Officer were as under :—

“Except charge No. 4 and 6 no other charges are proved against the delinquent.

So far as charge No. 4 is concerned, there is no direct evidence to show that corrupt practice was done by the delinquent Mr. Vyas. But he has gone beyond his power in enlarging the accused on bail in case of Section 307 I.P. Code etc