Siri Jagan, J.

Perceiving a conflict between two Division Bench decisions of this court, viz., Board of Revenue v. Parameswaran Nair, (2000 (1) KLT 227 and Jayarajan v. State of Kerala (2001 (3) KLT 929 on the interpretation of Rule 3 of Part III of the Kerala Service Rules (KSR) on the issue as to whether the Government can withdraw or withhold pension under the said rule as a punishment on a retired government servant, even if the grave misconduct proved against the pensioner does not involve pecuniary loss to the Government, a learned single Judge of this court has referred this original petition for the decision of a Full Bench of this court to resolve the apparent conflict between the two decisions. It is on such reference this original petition has come up before us for decision.

2. The facts necessary for the disposal of this original petition are as follows:-

The petitioner retired from service while holding the post of Sub Inspector of Police in the Kerala Police Department. On the date previous to his retirement, i.e., 30.12.1995, a memo of charges was served on him alleging that while he was holding the post of station house officer, Balaramapuram, during the pe