Punishment in disciplinary proceedings must adhere to principles of natural justice and be proportionate to the misconduct; excessive punishment may warrant judicial intervention.

Order :

1. The petitioner has preferred the instant writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India being aggrieved of the order dated 17.02.2022 (Annex.9), whereby a punishment of "Be Dismissed without Notice" has been inflicted upon him pursuant to a departmental enquiry conducted against him.

2. Briefly stated, facts of the case are that the petitioner was appointed in sub-ordinate cadre (Peon) in the Punjab National Bank, Circle Udaipur vide order dated 29.03.2016, whereafter he was made permanent on the post of Peon-cum-Daftary vide order dated 27.03.2017. The petitioner was put under suspension vide order dated 05.12.2020 under the provisions of the para 14 of the Bipartite Settlement dated 10.04.2002 and thereafter a show cause notice dated 24.12.2020 was served upon him alleging two irregularities, viz. (1) that he had made unauthorized cash loading in ATM without any office order and (2) that there are many high value/abnormal transactions in his account. The petitioner submitted his reply to the show cause notice justifying his act and explaining the transactions in the account. Being dissatisfied with the reply, the respondent authorities served a charge-sheet dated 10.06.2021 upon the petitioner under the provisions of para 5(j) of the Bipartite Settlement dated 10.04.2002, wherein two charges identical to the ones mentioned in the show cause notice were levelled against the petitioner. The petitioner submitted a detailed reply to the charge-sheet on 24.06.2021. The disciplinary authority after receipt of the reply decided to proceed with the disciplinary proceedings and vide order dated 22.07.2021 appointed enquiry officer and enquiry was commenced against the petitioner. The enquiry officer concluded that the petitioner was guilty of both the charges and accordingly, submitted the enquiry report dated 20.01.2022. The disciplinary authority accepted the findings of the enquiry officer and consequently, issued a show cause notice dated 29.01.2022 to the petitioner proposing a punishment of "Be Dismissed without Notice" as per para 6(a) of the Bipartite Agreement. The petitioner was provided opportunity of personal hearing, in pursuance of which he appeared before the disciplinary authority on 07.02.2022 with his defence representative and also submitted his written representation praying for reconsideration on the point of punishment. The disciplinary authority vide the order impugned dated 17.02.2022 imposed the punishment of "dismissal from service without notice" upon the petitioner. Being aggrieved of the same, the petitioner has preferred the instant writ petition.

3. Learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the departmental enquiry conducted by the respondent bank suffers from gross violation of principles of natural justice. The petitioner produced oral as well as documentary evidence before the enquiry officer justifying his act as well as the transactions in his account, but the enquiry officer did not take into consideration the same and concluded that the petitioner is guilty of the charges, thus, enquiry proceedings were just empty formality. Further the disciplinary authority simply accepted the findings of the enquiry officer without independent application of mind and did not ascertain whether the charges were carrying any serious misendeavour or minor in nature, simply awarded the harsh penalty of dismissal from service.

4. Regarding the charge No.1, learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the said charge is baseless and does not hold ground as the petitioner being an employee of subordinate class, i.e. Peon cum Daftary (Class IV) has acted only upon the orders/directions of his superior officers in regard to operating of the ATM machine. The duty of operating ATM machine was though not assigned to the petitioner in writing but the senior officers present in the bank asked him to operate the ATM machine, which is reflected from the fact that for operating ATM machine, key