Point of Law : Compulsory retirement from service is not considered to be a punishment.

JUDGMENT :

Heard Ms. S. Bora, learned counsel for the petitioner as well as Mrs. A. Gayan, learned CGC appearing for the respondents.

2. The petitioner therein was compulsorily retired on completion of 30 years of service and upon attaining the age of 55 years. The legality of the orders by which the petitioner was respectively retired, is under challenge in this writ petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India. The petitioner has also prayed to direct the respondent authorities to allow him to continue in service up to the normal age of superannuation, i.e. up to 60 years. It may be mentioned that by virtue of interim order passed in the writ petition, the operation of the impugned order was suspended/ kept in abeyance.

3. In brief, the case of the petitioner is that he was enrolled as Rifleman (General Duty) on 20.12.1987 and was serving in 33 Bn., Assam Rifles, C/O 99 APO. In due course, he was promoted as Havildar (GD) on 16.12.2009. It is not in dispute that the petitioner is medically fit and is in SHAPE-I category. On 08.08.2016, from the office of the Commandant 33 Bn., Assam Rifles an order was issued where the petitioner was directed to submit the documents to the record branch of 33 Bn., Assam Rifles at the earliest for preparation of pension documents.

4. The learned counsel for the petitioner has meticulously referring to the statements made and documents appended to the writ petition has submitted that before issuance of the impugned order of compulsory retirement, the mandatory procedure prescribed under Rule 48 of the Fundamental Rules and Rule 56(j) of the Central Civil Service (Pension) Rules, 1972 [CCS (Pension) Rules for short] was not followed. It was also submitted that while passing the impugned order, the entire service record of the petitioner was not looked into by the Court constituted for the purpose of determining whether or not to retain the service of the petitioner beyond 30 years. It was further submitted that the respondent authorities had not followed the prescribed procedure and guidelines as laid down in advisory no. I.31019/AR/2015/Adm-III/227 dated 21.08.2015, before issuing the impugned order dated 11.08.2017. It was further submitted that the impugned order was absolutely misleading because it was mention therein that the petitioner was permitted to retire, whereas at no point of time, the petitioner had given notice to the respondents of his intention to retire. Accordingly, it was submitted that by the impugned order, it was sought to be projected by the respondents as if the petitioner was being compulsorily retired as per his own request. The legality of the said impugned order also been assailed on the ground that the petitioner was being compulsorily retired in public interest. Hence, it was submitted that the compulsorily retirement of the petitioner was tainted with malice and was passed on extraneous consideration.

5. In support of his submissions, the learned counsel for the petitioner has placed reliance, (i) Sukhdev Singh v. Union of India & Ors., (2013) 9 SCC 566, (ii) Abhijit Ghosh Dastidar v. Union of India & Ors., (2009) 16 SCC 146, (iii) Dev Dutt v. Union of India, (2008) 8 SCC 725, (iv) Sunil Kumar Shahi v. Union of India & Ors., WP(C) 1250/2015 and connected writ petition, decided by this Court by judgment and order dated 15.06.2016, (v) Yogendra Nath Singh v. Union of India & Ors., WP(C) 4872/2019, decided by this Court by judgment and order dated 27.01.2022, (vi) Gavendra Kumar v. Union of India & Ors., WP(C) 270/2021 decided by the High Court of Meghalaya at Shillong by order dated 22.04.2022.

6. Per-contra, by referring to the following cases, being (i) Baikuntha Nath Das & Anr. v. Chief District Medical Officer, Baripada & Anr., (1992) 2 SCC 299, (ii) Posts & Telegraphs Board & Ors. v. C.S.N. Murthy, (1992) 2 SCC 317, (iii) Union of India v. V.P