VIGILANCE MANUAL VOLUME III - AP Online

688 DECISION - 341
inquiries where there is a report on account of the fact that an officer
other than the disciplinary authority has been constituted as the Inquiry
Officer, and that would be a reasonable classification keeping away
the application of Article 14 of the Constitution. Supreme Court held
that judgments in the different High Courts and by the two-judge
Bench of the Supreme Court taking the contrary view will no longer
be taken to be laying down good law, “but this shall have prospective
application and no punishment imposed shall be open to challenge
on this ground”. Supreme Court also clarified that “this decision may
not preclude the disciplinary authority from revising the proceeding
and continuing with it in accordance with law from the stage of supply
of the inquiry report in cases where dismissal or removal was the
punishment”.
The Supreme Court, in effect, held: “Wherever there has
been an Inquiry Officer and he has furnished a report to the disciplinary
authority at the conclusion of the inquiry holding the delinquent guilty
of all or any of the charges with proposal for any particular punishment
or not, the delinquent is entitled to a copy of such report and will also
be entitled to make a representation against it, if he so desires, and
non-furnishing of the report would amount to violation of rules of
natural justice and make the final order liable to challenge hereafter.”
(341)
Termination — of temporary service
Termination of an ad hoc temporary employee,
whose work and conduct were not satisfactory and
who was unsuitable for the service, not illegal or
unjustified on the ground of juniors being retained
in service. Order not necessarily punitive where
preliminary inquiry into allegations is held or where
a departmental inquiry is held but dropped or
abandoned before the issue of order of termination.
State of Uttar Pradesh vs. Kaushal Kishore Shukla,
1991 (1) SLR SC 606