Courts should not interfere with well-reasoned order of disciplinary committee on grounds of sympathy: Supreme Court

The Supreme Court on Tuesday held that a High Court cannot set aside a well-reasoned order only on grounds of sympathy and sentiments, especially in cases involving misconduct by public servants [Union of India v. M. Duraiswamy]..A Bench of Justices of MR Shah and BV Nagarathna held that courts should not ordinarily interfere with the quantum of punishment imposed upon a delinquent employee if all the procedural requirements have been complied with."Being a public servant in the post office, the delinquent officer was holding the post of trust. Merely because subsequently the employee had deposited the defrauded amount and therefore there was no loss caused to the department cannot be a ground to take a lenient view and/or to show undue sympathy in favour of such an employee. What about the loss caused to the department by way of goodwill, name and fame of the department and its reliability amongst the public? By such a misconduct/act on the part of the delinquent officer, the reputation of the department had been tarnished," the top court said in its judgment. .The Bench opined that the nature and gravity of the misconduct must be considered before interfering with the quantum of punishment awarded to the delinquent officer. "Once, a conscious decision was taken by the Disciplinary Authority to remove an employee on the proved misconduct of a very serious nature of defrauding public money, neither the Tribunal nor the High Court should have interfered with the order of punishment imposed by the Disciplinary Authority, which was after considering the gravity and seriousness of the misconduct," the judgment stated..The Court passed the judgement on an appeal moved by the Central government against an order of the Madras High Court which had dismissed their plea to set aside an order of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT)The CAT had modified the punishment of the respondent public servant from dismissal/removal from service to compulsory retirement.The respondent was a Postal Assistant who defrauded the postal department of ₹16,59,065. A departmental enquiry into the fraud was initiated following which, he deposited the defrauded amount along with the interest and admitted to his act of fraud before the enquiry committee. The disciplinary committee, after noting the seriousness of the misconduct, passed an order for removal from service. The respondent challenged the same before CAT which altered the punishment to compulsory retirement after noting he had confessed and had completed 39 years of service.The CAT's order was upheld by the Madras High Court, prompting the Central government to file the present appeal..The Supreme Court in its judgment set aside the order of the Madras High Court and in effect, revived the original punishment of removal from service. Referring to its decision in BC Chaturvedi v. Union of India, and considering the facts of the case, the top court reasoned that substituting the punishment cannot be allowed as there was no irregularity in the enquiry process.On the CAT and High Court's reasoning towards his time in service, the Bench said,"Merely because the respondent-employee had worked for 39 years and in those years, there was no punishment imposed and/or that he voluntarily deposited the defrauded amount along with penal interest and therefore there was no loss to the Government/Department cannot be a ground to interfere with the order of punishment imposed by the Disciplinary Authority and substitute the same from removal to that of compulsory retirement"..Therefore, the court set aside the judgments of the Madras High Court and the CAT which substituted the punishment of removal to that of compulsory retirement. .Additional Solicitor General of India Balbir Singh appeared for the Union of India..[Read Judgment]