The court emphasized the importance of conducting disciplinary proceedings in accordance with the prescribed rules and found no violation warranting interference at that stage.

Ranjit Singh, J.

1. The petitioner, who is a Bank employee and is being proceeded against for disciplinary action, has prayed for intervention with the enquiry while it is in progress on the ground that his rights to defend himself properly, is being prejudiced.

2. A charge sheet dated 21.4.2010 is issued to the petitioner, containing various allegations in regard to his conduct for not carrying out pre-sanctioned appraisal of loan before recommending credit facilities in favour of various parties. The petitioner is also accused of not keeping effective control over the loan documents and had debited various demand loan accounts unauthorizedly. He is also accused of misusing his official position for getting sanction of housing loan in the names of his wife and son and for having engaged himself in business in violation of the Bank guidelines.

3. Enquiry Officer has been appointed, who had asked the petitioner to verify the documents. The petitioner instead prayed for time till his defence assistance is available. The proceedings of the enquiry annexed with the petition (Annexure P-4) would show that the petitioner admitted receipt of one set of managements documents and requested for time for verification. The enquiry proceedings were accordingly adjourned to 19.9.2010 i.e. for 9 days. In fact, these proceedings were held on 10.9.2010, having been adjourned on 28.8.2010, on which date the petitioner had sought time to arrange defence assistance. The petitioner then approached the Disciplinary Authority on 14.9.2010 for providing him the services of defence assistance. He was informed through letter dated 20.9.2010 that he may take the assistance of any other employee, who is not having two disciplinary cases pending on him. The petitioner had also made a grievance that the documents supplied to him contained some additional documents, which were not part and parcel of the list of documents supplied alongwith the charge sheet.

4. The Enquiry Officer, however, adjourned the proceedings for examining the witnesses without properly attending to the request of the petitioner. As per the petitioner, the Presenting Officer could not submit additional list of documents, for which he made a representation and this would lead to inherent defect or lacuna in the proceedings of enquiry. The petitioner would urge that the Enquiry Officer allowed the examination of management witnesses even without supplying the list of defence documents, thus, causing prejudice to the petitioner. The petitioner has prayed for permission to inspect the documents or the record/files concerning different loans and submitted a detailed representation about the illegal manner in which the enquiry proceedings were being conducted. The representations of the petitioner have been rejected by the Disciplinary Authority and accordingly he has filed the present petition to impugn the said order.

5. The procedure for imposing major penalty is contained in Regulation 6 of Punjab National Bank Officers Employees (Discipline and Appeal) Regulation, 1977 (hereinafter called, "the Regulation"). Having given out as to how the Disciplinary Authority will proceed to direct enquiry, the procedure to be adopted by the Enquiry Officer is fully regulated under Regulation 6 of the Regulation. As per this procedure, the Enquiry Authority is to issue notice in writing specifying the date on which the officer/employee shall appear in person before him. The officer employee then would appear before the Enquiry Authority on the date specified in the notice. The enquiry authority is then to ask the employee whether he pleads guilty or has any defence to make. If the employee pleads guilty to any of the article of charges, the enquiry authority is to record the same and then sign the record and obtain the signatures of the officer employee. Upon this, the Enquiry Authority shall return a finding of guilty in respect of those article of charges, to which the officer employee has