Service Law – Disciplianry Proceedings – Civil suit having been decided in favour of an employee on an identical cause of action – Disciplinary proceedings on identical issues are liable to be quashed.

Mr. Amol Rattan Singh, J. (Oral):- CM No. 17731-CWP-2017

1. By this application, the applicant-petitioner seeks to place on record two judgments and decrees of the Additional and District Judge, Karnal, dated 09.01.2017, as Annexures P-10 and P-11, respectively.

2. The application is allowed and the aforesaid judgments and decrees are taken on record as Annexures P-10 and P-11 with the accompanying petition.

CWP No. 5280 of 2014 (O&M)

3. The petitioner has challenged issuance of the impugned charge-sheet dated 01.01.2009, Annexure P-7, alleging therein against him that while he was deployed as the Mandi Inspector-cum-Store Keeper in Indri Mandi, during the Rabi marketing season 2000-01, he had caused a wrongful loss to the Corporation amounting to Rs. 15,02,300/-, and for the season 2002-03 a further loss of Rs. 7,52,741./-

4. The said charge-sheet was issued to him about 2½ years after his superannuation from service on 31.05.2006, though earlier two charge-sheets, dated 28.06.2005 and 21.02.2006, had been issued to him, which were substituted vide the impugned consolidated charge-sheet. Both the aforesaid charge-sheets are stated to have been duly served upon him during the time that he was still in service.

5. On account of the issuance of the aforesaid charge-sheets, the petitioner was denied his retirement benefits, leading to his filing Civil Suit no. 542 of 2012, seeking therein release of those benefits, which suit was decreed in his favour.

6. Prior to that however, the respondent-Corporation had also instituted Civil Suit no. 668 of 2007 on 04.08.2007, seeking recovery of an amount of Rs. 23,10,776/- (i.e. a total of the two amounts that were subject matter of the two separate charge-sheets).

7. The suit of the respondent-Corporation was dismissed by the learned Additional Civil Judge (Senior Division), Karnal, vide his judgment and decree dated 19.09.2011 (a copy of which has been annexed as Annexure P-5 with the petition), whereas the suit of the present petitioner (plaintiff in Civil Suit no. 542 of 2012), as noticed, was decreed in his favour, vide a judgment dated 29.05.2013 (Annexure P-8 with the petition.).

8. Against the aforesaid two judgments and decrees, the respondent- Corporation herein filed two ‘first appeals’, which were both dismissed vide separate judgments passed by the learned Additional District Judge, Karnal, on 09.01.2017, (copies of which have been taken on record today as Annexures P-10 and P-11)

9. The petitioner therefore naturally contends in this petition that the issue of recovery of the aforesaid amount from him having been dealt with on merits in the civil suit for recovery by the learned Civil Court, it having been held that he was not responsible in any manner for causing the losses to the Corporation, in both the suits, with those judgments having become final, (no Regular Second Appeal having been filed by the respondent-Corporation before this Court), the respondents are disentitled now from trying to make a recovery from him by pursuing the charge-sheet issued to him on the same cause of action, even though it remained pending at the time when the civil suits were pending before the Civil Court.

10. In the reply filed by the respondents to this petition, it is stated that as per the report of the enquiry officer dated 11.06.2014, a copy of which has been annexed as Annexure R-1 with the reply, the petitioner has been held guilty of having caused losses to the Corporation, as per the charges framed against him, and therefore action was to be taken against him by the competent authority, accordingly.

11. Learned counsel for the respondent-Corporation has also produced in Court today an order dated 13.03.2015, passed by the Managing Director of the Corporation, accepting the report of the enquiry officer and imposing a punishment of recovery of Rs. 23,10,776/- along with the interest thereupon, “at the rate of CCL” (Cash Credit Limit), the interest