Judgment

HANSARIA, J.-Procedure is handmaid of justice. That is a trite saying. By the same token, procedural safeguard cannot be placed at such high a pedestal as always to knock down an order passed in violation of the same, if it be otherwise legal. This is due to legal maxim "Quilibet potest renunciare juri pro se introducto", meaning, an individual may renounce a law made for his special benefit.

2. The above is the keynote thought which would pervade in the present cases, one of which is an appeal by special leave against the judgment of Jammu and Kashmir High Court in CSA No. 1 of 1989 rendered on April 19, 1990 by which the High Court allowed the appeal of the respondent-State and set aside the judgment of District Munsif, Poonch by which a suit of the appellant challenging the order of dismissal passed on January 31, 1978 had been decreed, which order had come to be upheld by District Judge, feeling aggrieved at which the High Court had been approached by way of second appeal. Another is a writ petition filed directly in this Court making a grievance about illegal termination of service and seeking a declaration that dismissal was void and non est.

3. The High Court dismissed the suit of the appellant on two grounds: (1) the civil court had no jurisdiction to entertain the suit; and (2) the suit was barred by res judicata.

4. Shri Mehta appearing for the appellant contends that as the order of dismissal had come to be passed in violation of a mandatory requirement, the view taken that the civil court had no jurisdiction is untenable in law. As to res judicata it is urged that the stand taken by the High Court that this principle applied, because of earlier proceedings in the High Court in Writ Petition No. 28 of 1978 which gave rise to LPA No. 43 of 1979 was misconceived.

5. Let us first deal with the question of jurisdiction. To decide this, reference may be made to skeletal facts. These are that the conduct of the appellant while serving as a clerk in the Office of Commandant, Home Guards at Poonch came to be enquired in the year 1972 by Anti-Corruption Commission set up under the provisions of Jammu and Kashmir (Government Servants) Prevention of Corruption Act, 1962 (hereinafter referred to as the Act). The Commission vide its order dated March 14, 1974, recommended to the Governor the dismissal of the appellant from service. After receipt of this recommendation the appellant was called upon on July 4, 1974 to show cause as to why he should not be dismissed from service. By communications of August 13, 1974 and January 4, 1976 the appellant approached the officer concerned to supply copy of the proceedings of the inquiry including the report of the Commission to enable him to submit his explanation. This not having been done, the appellant challenged the action by approaching the High Court in WP No. 413 of 1978 which came to be disposed of on March 15, 1978 with the direction to the authorities to make available a copy of the proceedings of the inquiry. Before that order had come to be passed, the appellant had been dismissed from service by an order dated January 31, 1978 which came to be challenged in Writ Petition No. 23 of 1978. That petition was dismissed by judgment dated June 1, 1979 on the ground that a very complicated question of fact was involved. A Letters Patent Appeal being preferred the Bench also took the view that "a disputed question of fact of complicated nature was involved". The Bench, however, observed that its order will not "prevent the appellant from pursuing whatever other remedy may be available to him under law".

6. Thereafter started the present proceeding which consists of filing of a suit by the appellant on July 26, 1980 challenging the order of dismissal as void and illegal. The trial court decreed the suit principally on the ground that the appellant had not been supplied with a copy of enquiry proceedings and the dismissal order was passed in violation of the mandatory provision of Se