Pepsu Road Transport Corporation, Patiala vs Dalbir Singh and others

Mahesh Grover, J.—By this common order, we dispose of Letters Patent Appeal Nos.1051 of 1052 of 2009, as they originate from the grievance of the Pepsu Road Transport Corporation against the judgment of the learned Single Judge dated 30.7.2009. Two of the employees of the appellant/Corporation namely Dalbir Singh Driver and Kuldip Singh Conductor faced disciplinary proceedings of the charge of plying a bus on a special trip from Khalra to Bhikhiwind and by issuing used tickets, committed a fraud with the Corporation of an amount of Rs.35/-.

The charge was enquired into and established before the Enquiry Officer leading to the termination of the services of both the employees which further led to a reference being claimed by them under the provisions of the Industrial Disputes Act which was rejected by the Labour Court-cum-Industrial Tribunal, Patiala resulting in two Civil Writ Petitions No. 16319 of 1992 and 1331 of 1993 having been filed, the answer to which was given by the learned Single Judge accepting the plea of the writ petitioners in totality by setting aside the termination and ordering the reinstatement in the case of writ petitioner Dalbir Singh, Driver (in C.W.P. No. 16319 of 1992) and partially in the case of Kuldip Singh, Conductor (in C.W.P. No. 1331 of 1993) in whose case instead of reinstatement, an amount of Rs.3 lacs as compensation was granted.

Aggrieved by the said judgment, in these two L.P.A. Nos.1051 and 1052 of 2009, the learned counsel for the appellant has contended that at the time of inspection, a report was prepared to which the respondents herein (writ petitioners) had appended their signatures and this itself was sufficient to establish the veracity of the charge against them. Much emphasis has been laid by the learned counsel for the appellant on this aspect of the matter to state that there is no escape from an inference about the charge having been proved when there is no denial to the signatures being appended to this report by the respondents.

On the other hand, learned counsel for the respondents has referred to the report of the Enquiry Officer which is on record as Annexure P-3 to the writ petition to say that the same was cryptic. He contends that there is no material on record from where the charge against the respondents could be established.

We have considered the contention and the issues raised before us and are of the opinion that it was the duty of the appellant to have proved the charge against the writ petitioners conclusively. The essentials of the charge against the respondents/writ petitioners who are the Driver and Conductor respectively of the bus are that they allegedly unauthorisedly used the bus to ply on a particular route and in the process, handed out used tickets to the passengers.

If the record is to be seen, then except for this assertion on the part of the appellant, there is no credible material from where the basic charge of the unauthorised plying of the bus would be established and if this be so, then axiomatically the charge of handing out used tickets to the passengers would also be unsustainable; being a part of the same transaction.

The strong emphasis laid by the learned counsel for the appellant on the report of the Inspector does not enhance its case at all in view of the fact that the copy of this report was never given to the respondents/workmen and neither were they confronted with it at the time of leading evidence before the Tribunal. We have also perused the enquiry report Annexure P-3 on record which is cryptic and much short of the expectations of a report that could sustain a harsh punishment of dismissal from service.

We have thus no hesitation in holding that the charge against the respondents (writ petitioners) was largely unsubstantiated and consequently, the termination was unsustainable in law.

There is thus no difficulty in affirming the findings recorded by the learned Single Judge in so far as the Driver of the bus Dalbir Singh(petitioner in C.W.P. No. 16319 of 1992) is concerned.

In so far as the case of Kuldip Singh, Conductor (petitioner in C.W.P. No. 1331 of 1993) is concerned, we are of the opinion that the judgment of the learned Single Judge needs to be modified on this count for the simple reason that if the charge against the respondent/workman has not been proved then there is no question of examining the issue of an employee allegedly having lost the confidence of his employer.

Even though this part is not in appeal (C.W.P. No. 1331 of 1993), but the issue has been raised before us that this Court is well within its jurisdiction to order the correction of errors, even if not appealed against. We, thus hold that both the Letters Patent Appeals deserve to be dismissed and the judgment of the learned Single Judge in so far as Dalbir Singh, Driver (petitioner in C.W.P. No. 16319 of 1992) is concerned, deserves to be affirmed, while so far as Kuldip Singh, Conductor (petitioner in C.W.P. No. 1331 of 1993) is concerned, it needs to be modified to say that he shall also be entitled to reinstatement.