JUDGMENT :

Shree Chandrashekhar, J.

The delinquent officer who is the appellant has suffered the penalty of removal from service in a domestic inquiry constituted under Regulation 6.3 of the Punjab National Bank Officer Employees' (Discipline & Appeal) Regulations, 1977 (in short, PNB Regulations). He approached the writ Court in WP(S) No. 3326 of 2020 after the statutory appeal filed by him under Regulation 17 of the PNB Regulations was dismissed vide order dated 25th June 2020 by the Appellate Authority who is the Managing Director and CEO, Human Resource Management Division, HO, New Delhi.

2. Before the writ Court, a preliminary objection as regards maintainability of the writ petition on the ground of lack of territorial jurisdiction of this High Court was raised by the Punjab National Bank (in short, ‘PNB’) with reference to the judgment in “ONGC v. Utpal Kumar Basu” (1994) 4 SCC 711 and an order dated 26th February 2019 passed by this Court in WP(S) No. 4078 of 2017.

3. The issue of maintainability of the writ petition has been elaborately dealt with by the writ Court with re