Point of Law: Departmental enquiry proceeded against the petitioners in both the cases and the consequential order of dismissal from service pertained to the same incident and the same materials were relied upon by the Enquiry Officer and the same witnesses deposed in both the cases.

JUDGMENT :

SOUMITRA SAIKIA, J.

1. This writ petition is filed by the petitioner assailing the order of dismissal from service pursuant to a Disciplinary Enquiry instituted against him by the respondent authorities. The petitioner who originally hails from Varanasi in the State of UP, joined the CISF as a Constable and was posted in the ONGC Unit, Jorhat in the State of Assam with effect from 01.06.1994. While he was serving in the State Unit, an allegation was raised against him that the petitioner along with another constable namely Santosh Kumar Singh had assaulted/ manhandled and had pushed SI/EXO R.G. Karnan on 17.01.1996 at about 09.30 AM. An enquiry was ordered into by the respondent authority and thereafter, a memorandum of charge was issued to the petitioner on 30.04.1996. A separate disciplinary enquiry was also initiated against the other constable namely, Santosh Kumar Singh. The writ petitioner submitted his reply on 13.06.1996 denying the allegations as reflected in the memorandum of charges. Thereafter, an Enquiry Officer upon completion of the enquiry submitted its enquiry report on 16.09.1996. A copy of the enquiry report was also served on the petitioner with a direction to submit his reply against the findings arrived at by the Enquiry Officer. The petitioner filed an application before the Commandant, CISF Unit, Jorhat against the findings arrived at by the Enquiry Officer. The disciplinary enquiry namely, the Commandant, CIST Unit, Jorhat vide order dated 30.10.2016 issued the impugned order of dismissal from service.

2. Against the said dismissal order, the petitioner initially approached the High Court of Allahabad by filing a writ petition being W.P(C) No. 10317/1999 vide order dated 15.09.2006. The Allahabad High Court dismissed the writ petition on the ground of lack of territorial jurisdiction. Thereafter, the petitioner approached this Court by filing the instant writ petition. However, during the pendency of the writ petition, he was convicted by a Criminal Court and put behind the bars as a consequence thereof he could not instruct his counsel and the instant writ petition came to be dismissed due to non-prosecution vide order dated 28.11.2013 passed by this Court. After his acquittal, the petitioner took steps for restoration of the writ petition vide order dated 15.11.2021 and the writ petition was restored.

3. The learned counsels for the parties are at idem that the petitioner in the present proceedings as well as the petitioner in W.P.(C) No. 4517/2008 namely, Santosh Kumar Singh, were the two constables against whom the disciplinary proceedings were initiated for the same incident and they were both dismissed from the services by the Disciplinary Authority pursuant to enquiries held. Both the present petitioner and Santosh Kumar Singh had challenged the orders of the enquiry proceedings as well as the order of their dismissal by two separate writ petitions. Santosh Kumar Singh had filed W.P.(C) No. 4517/2008.

4. It is the submission of the learned counsel for the petitioner that both these writ petitions were initially taken up together, however, due to the dismissal for non-prosecution of the writ petition, it could not be taken up for hearing together with W.P.(C) No. 4517/2008.

5. It is submitted that vide Judgment dated 10.05.2018, this Court in W.P(C) No. 4517/2008 had interfered with and set aside with the findings of the Enquiry Officer and the consequential dismissal order. The respondent/CISF filed an appeal against this Judgment and Order being W.A. No. 120/2019. This Court by Judgment dated 29.08.2019 dismissed the writ appeal and upheld the order passed by the learned Single Judge.

6. The learned counsels for the parties have fairly submitted that although separate disciplinary proceedings were initiated and the separate findings were arrived at by the Enquiry Officer and thereafter,