The Bombay High Court has refused to interfere with the decision of authorities to compulsorily retire a junior telecom officer in Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd after a departmental inquiry held him guilty in a case of loss of telephone cables.
“No case has been made out by the petitioner to cause interference by this (High) court in exercise of its writ jurisdiction… the petition is dismissed,” Justices Naresh Patil and Prakash Naik said in a recent judgement.
The petitioner, Prakash Tyagi, joined services as Junior Telecom Officer in the erstwhile Mumbai Telephone in 1979. By an order dated February 4, 1988, he was placed under suspension, as a departmental enquiry was ordered on account of missing 600 metres of cable.
The charges mentioned in the charge-sheet issued in 1989 related to loss of telephone cable and other related matters.
An FIR was lodged with Juhu Police Station on February 9, 1988 in connection with the incident.
The department alleged that the petitioner, while working as Junior Telecom Officer (JTO), had not laid cables of about 600 metres, but created record showing that he had executed the work. The un-utilised stock of cable thus remained unaccounted for, according to the department.
The petitioner denied the charges levelled against him.
An Enquiry Officer was appointed who held a probe and filed a report on January 7, 1991, holding the petitioner guilty of missing cables mentioned in charges 1 to 4 in the chargesheet, while exonerating him from two other charges.
Petitioner’s contention was that the Enquiry Officer has not given any reason as to why he had recorded finding of guilt in respect of charges 1 to 4 in the chargesheet.
Thereafter, the disciplinary authority passed an order on August 17, 1995, compulsorily retiring the petitioner.
( Source – PTI )
