The punishment imposed on the petitioner was found to be justified and not disproportionate to the proved charges. The court also recognized the petitioner's eligibility for notional promotion and corresponding retirement benefits.

S. TAMILVANAN, J.

W.P. No. 40119 of 2002 has been filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India to issue a writ of certiorarified mandamus, directing to call for the records in O.A. No. 5801 of 2001, dated 14.6.2002 on the file of the Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal, Chennai and quash the same, in so far as the rejection of the claim for the promotion of the petitioner is concerned and also to direct the first and second respondents to consider the claim of the petitioner for the promotion as Superintending Engineer and Chief Engineer by including the name of the petitioner in appropriate places in the panels for Superintending Engineer and Chief Engineer for the years 2000-2001 and 2001-2002 respectively.

2. W.P. No. 40120 of 2002 has been filed seeking the order in the nature of a writ of certiorari to call for the records in O.A. No. 5802 of 2001, dated 14.6.2002 on the file of the Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal, Chennai and quash the order dated 14.6.2002 made in so far as it confirms the punishment of stoppage of increment for two years without cumulative effect passed against the petitioner in G.O. 2(D) No. 49, PWD dated 16.10.2000 on the file of the first respondent.

3. It is seen that the writ petitioner herein had filed O.A. No. 5801 and 5802 of 2001 before the Administrative Tribunal, Chennai under Section 19 of the Tamil Nadu Administrative Tribunal, Act, 1985, to call for the records from the second respondent herein in memo No. C1.(1)/12010/00-3 dated 24.08.2001 and quash the same in the panel of Superintending Engineer, for the year 2000-2001 and to pass appropriate orders in the circumstances of the case. In O.A. No. 5802 of 2001 the petitioner had sought for an order to call for the records of the respondent in G.O. (2D) No. 49 dated 16.10.2000 and quash the same. After considering both the Original Applications on merits, the Administrative Tribunal by a common order dated 14.6.2002, held that the writ petitioner herein, being a Government servant cannot be promoted during the currency of punishment and on that ground dismissed the O.A. No. 5801 of 2001. So far as O.A. No. 5802 of 2001 is concerned, the impugned order therein was set side by the Tribunal to a limited extent that there will be no recovery of Rs. 1.33 lakhs from the writ petitioner and only that to extent, the G.O. was set aside and in other words, punishment was held to be sustained.

4. It is not in dispute that on the date of filing of the aforesaid applications, the petitioner Thiru I. Subramanian was working as Executive Engineer, Buildings Division, Trichy. The writ petitioner was appointed initially as Junior Engineer in the year 1969, after he was selected by Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission, then he was sent on deputation to the Tamil Nadu State Construction Corporation, Madurai as site engineer on 1.11.1980 and in 1981 he was promoted as Assistant Executive Engineer in PWD and as Project Engineer in the Tamil Nadu State Construction Corporation, Madurai. It is an admitted fact that in 1991, the writ petitioner was promoted as Assistant Executive Engineer in PWD and also project engineer in the Tamil Nadu State Construction Corporation and he was in charge of the construction of commercial tax officers building complex between 1981-1984 and on 31.10.1985 he was relieved from the Tamil Nadu State Construction Corporation.

5. It is not in dispute that the Tamil Nadu State Construction Corporation, a State undertaking was formed by the State Government for the purpose of undertaking construction works of various projects by itself. The Engineers in various departments of the Government of Tamil Nadu, mainly from PWD have been entrusted with the task of construction work from masonry work upto completion of construction and at the same time, their work was not hampered by too many restrictions usually placed as per the special procedure prescribed in the P.W.D. code. Though the Corporation was created as an independe