The main legal point established in the judgment is the application of the principle of proportionality in determining the appropriateness of the punishment imposed on an employee for misconduct.

Introduction:

An employee wins a foreign jaunt; apart from the pleasure pursuit, the employee will undergo training abroad. On board the flight bound overseas, the employee is found drunk, too much. He is deplaned. The employer treats it as grave misconduct, punishes him with removal from service. Is the punishment shockingly disproportionate?

Facts:

2. M.G. Venu, the petitioner, joined SBI Life Insurance Company Ltd. ("the employer"), the first respondent, in 2005 as a Unit Manager. In nine years, he had earned five promotions--three in the first year. In 2013, the employer held a business contest, in which most of its employees participated. The successful employees would earn a trip to Colombo, where they had to attend a programme sponsored by the employer. Venu won the trip along with a few other officers.

3. On 23.11.2013, the employees, including Venu, transited at Chennai and boarded the plane to Colombo. But Venu was deplaned on the allegation that he had been found highly intoxicated.

4. Later, on 10.03.2014, the employer issued the Ext.P6 show-cause notice asking Venu why he should not be departmentally proceeded against for indiscipline: of conduct unbecoming of the Company's employees. After rejecting Venu's Ext.P7 explanation, on 15.05.2014, the employer inflicted on him Ext.P9 termination. The appeal he preferred to the Managing Director, the appellate authority, proved futile: through Ext.P10, the appellate authority refused to interfere. Then, Venu filed W.P.(C) No. 23023 of 2016 before this Court. He contested the punishment alleging that no enquiry was conducted and that he had no opportunity to defend himself.

5. This Court, through Ext.P11 judgment, directed the appellate authority to examine Venu's grievance and act further accordingly. To comply with the Ext.P11 judgment, the appellate authority heard Venu and passed Ext.P13 order dated 18.11.2016: The punishment imposed earlier--dismissal from service--was reiterated. Aggrieved, Venu has filed this writ petition.

Submissions:

The Petitioner's:

6. Smt. Surya Binoy S, the learned counsel for the petitioner, has strenuously contended that, of the Employees' Service Regulations, Clause (9)(3)(c) and (d) covering a facet of indiscipline has no application to the allegations levelled against Venu. According to her, the allegation that Venu had been intoxicated on board is not an act attributable to an employee on duty.

7. In elaboration, Smt. Binoy has submitted that Venu along with other employees, given his meritorious performance, earned a jaunt to Colombo; it is more a holiday than anything else--especially, an official engagement on foreign soil. She has also submitted that the employer has never framed any charges; nor has it placed any material, either documentary or oral, to establish that Venu had been inebriated and only because of that he was offloaded.

8. Smt. Binoy has drawn my attention to para 4 of Ext.P11, through which this Court has directed the appellate authority to consider the petitioner's objection that a formal enquiry had not been conducted. According to her, the appellate authority ought to have, in the first place, considered whether the punishment imposed on the employee had been vitiated because the employer had not conducted any enquiry. And, later, the appellate authority ought to have rendered a definite finding on that basis. Instead, the appellate authority, contends the learned counsel, proceeded further as if the enquiry were not required, and passed the impugned Ext.P13 order.

9. In the alternative, Smt. Binoy has also contended that the punishment imposed on Venu is grossly disproportionate. According to her, it violates the principle of proportionality, too.

SBI Life's:

10. Sri Jaju Babu, the learned Senior Counsel for the SBI Life, with equal vehemence, has contended that the employer, all along, had acknowledged that Venu performed well. And, in fact, for this reason, it gave Venu out-of-turn promotions, on more than one oc