Supreme Court: The present appeal was filed against the judgment and order dated 18-11-2022 (‘the impugned order’) passed by the Karnataka High Court (‘the High Court’), whereby the order dated 23-6-2022, passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal (‘the Tribunal’), was set aside. The Division Bench of Sanjay Kumar and Satish Chandra Sharma*, JJ., held that Rule 13(2) read with Rule 14 and Appendix 3 of the Central Civil Services (Classification, Control & Appeal) Rules, 1965 (‘CCS CCA Rules’), made it clear that an authority empowered to inflict minor penalties, like in the present case, General Manager, could issue a charge sheet even for imposition of major penalties. The Court allowed the appeal, set aside the impugned order and opined that initiation of disciplinary proceedings could be done by Member Telecommunications Commission as well as by General Manager, Telecommunication.
Background
The respondent was an employee serving in the Department of Telecommunication as Sub-Divisional Engineer, Group ‘B’ and was posted at Karnataka LSA (Licensed Service Area) DOT, Bengaluru, and on 31-5-2018, retired from service after attaining the age of superannuation. In 2003, the respondent was subjected to prosecution by CBI in two cases, firstly, for offences punishable under Sections 7 and 13(2) read with Section 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 (‘the 1988 Act’), for allegedly demanding and accepting a bribe of Rs 1 lakh from a Contractor, and secondly, for offences punishable under Section 13(1)(e) read with Section 13(2) of the 1988 Act, for allegedly possessing assets disproportionate to his known source of income. As the respondent was convicted in both the cases, he filed appeals before the High Court and the High Court stayed his conviction and his sentence vide orders dated 8-4-2014 and 22-4-2014, respectively, and the said appeals were still pending.
Further, disciplinary proceedings were also instituted against the respondent while he was working as Sub-Divisional Engineer Cable Construction—II in Bengaluru Telecom SSA (BGTD). On 27-5-2006 and 4-12-2008, two charge sheets were issued under Rule 14 of the CCS CCA Rules, for the said two cases, respectively.
The respondent submitted that the charge sheets were issued by an authority, who was competent to inflict only minor penalties, therefore, as the charge-sheet was not issued with the approval of the disciplinary authority empowered to inflict major penalty, the charge-sheet itself was void. The petitioner thus filed an original application which was dismissed by the Tribunal. Thereafter, the respondent being aggrieved by such dismissal, filed a writ petition before the High Court, and by the impugned order 18-11-2022, the High Court held that in cases where a charge-sheet was issued under Rule 14 of the CCS CCA Rules, by an authority empowered to inflict minor penalties, then the charge memo must be approved by the authority which was competent to inflict major penalty.
Analysis, Law, and Decision
The Court noted that the charge sheet was issued by the General Manager (Telecommunications) under Rule 14 of the CCS CCA Rules, which provided for a procedure for imposing major penalties. The Court stated that the respondent was unable to point out violation of any statutory provision of law and also, the disciplinary proceedings were conducted strictly in consonance with the procedure prescribed under Rule 14.
The Court observed that as per Appendix 3 appended to the CCS CCA Rules, the Member Telecommunications Commission was a competent authority to impose major penalties, and the General Manager, Telecommunications, was competent to impose minor penalties.
The Court referred to Rule 13(2) of the CCS CCA Rules and stated that as per the said Rule, a disciplinary authority competent under the rules “may institute disciplinary proceedings”. The Court thus held that Rule 13(2) read with Rule 14 and Appendix 3, made it clear that an authority empowered to inflict minor penalties, like in the present case, General Manager, could certainly issue a charge sheet even for imposition of major penalties. Thus, initiation of disciplinary proceedings could be done by Member Telecommunications Commission as well as by General Manager, Telecommunication.
The Court stated that the initiation was done by the General Manager, Telecommunication, and thus, as per the statutory provisions of the law, issuance of charge sheet by the General Manager could not been faulted upon by the High Court solely by relying on the case of Union of India v. B.V. Gopinath, (2014) 1 SCC 351. The Court opined that in the present case, the inquiry did not suffer from any procedural irregularity and the charge sheet was issued by the competent disciplinary authority and further, the final order was passed after following the due process of law by the competent disciplinary authority empowered to inflict major penalty. Therefore, the Tribunal had rightly dismissed the original application preferred by the respondent.
The Court thus allowed the appeal, set aside the impugned order and held that the proceedings initiated under charge memos, which were issued by the Principal General Manager, BGTD, Bengaluru, were validly initiated.
[Union of India v. R. Shankarappa, 2025 SCC OnLine SC 1510, decided on 25-7-2025]
*Judgment authored by: Justice Satish Chandra Sharma
Advocates who appeared in this case:
For the Appellants: K.M. Nataraj, A.S.G.; Sharath Narayan Nambiar, Advocate; Indira Bhakar, Advocate; Vinayak Sharma, Advocate; Vatsal Joshi, Advocate; Anuj Srinivas Udupa, Advocate; Chitransh Sharma, Advocate; Satvika Thakur, Advocate; Yogya Rajpurohit, Advocate; Aayush Saklani, Advocate; Nikita Capoor, Advocate; Subramaniam, Advocate; Sudarshan Lamba, AOR; Piyush Beriwal, Advocate; Arkaj Kumar, Advocate; Padmesh Mishra, Advocate; Bani Dkshit, Advocate; Shailesh Madiyal, Advocate; Amrish Kumar, Advocate
For the Respondent: P.A. Kulkarni, Advocate; Punam Kumari, AOR
