Santosh Kumar Yadav vs Chairman, Bihar State Co-operative Bank Limited, Head Office, Ashok Raj Patha, Patna and Others

V.N. Sinha, J.—Heard learned counsel for the petitioner and the counsel for the Bihar State Co-operative Bank Limited (hereinafter referred to as the Bank). Petitioner at the relevant time served on the post of Deposit Organizer in the Head Office of the Bank. He is aggrieved by the Office Order dated 17.2.2003, Annexure-5, whereunder he has been punished for failure to make entries in the ledger of the Bank with reference to the credit note of the National Central Cooperative Bank Ltd., Bettiah of 60 lacs for a period of 19 days. In this connection, he was served with the show cause notice dated 12.9.1997, in response whereto, petitioner accepted his mistake and submitted that the interest earned by the depositor for the period of 19 days may be deducted from his salary. Having considered the show cause reply filed by the petitioner, competent authority of the Bank has passed the impugned order dated 17.2.2003, Annexure-5 imposing on him the punishment of stoppage of one increment with cumulative effect with further direction that the increments earned by the petitioner during the period of the proceeding shall be payable to him with effect from the date of the order and not from the due date. Besides, it has also been observed that in case the creditor asked for interest in future, the same shall be recovered from his salary.

Counsel for the petitioner submitted that the impugned order dated 17.2.2003, Annexure-5 was challenged by the petitioner by filing appeal before the Registrar, Co-operative Societies, Bihar, Patna, which was allowed to be dismissed for default in the year 2005, as the present writ petition was filed on 5.2.2004.

In consideration of the fact that the appeal filed by the petitioner against the impugned order has been dismissed for default, I have entertained this writ petition, as the matter has remained pending before this Court for over six years.

Having heard counsel for the petitioner and the Bank, I set aside punishment nos. 1 and 2 of the impugned punishment order dated 17.2.2003, Annexure-5 and direct the authorities of the Bank to pay the arrears of all the increments to the petitioner from the due date, as the authorities of the Bank does not appear to have considered the submission of the petitioner that a chance be given to him in view of the fact that he is ready to bear the burden of interest for the period of 19 days, which fact has also been stated in paragraph 20 of the writ petition directing the Bank to recover the amount of interest for the period of 19 days from the salary of the petitioner and the amount be credited in the sundry account of the Bank, as the Creditor-Bank does not require such, interest to be remitted in its account in view of the contents of letter dated 9.7.2002, Annexure-3 of the Creditor Bank. The writ petition is, accordingly, disposed of.