Supreme Court stays reinstatement of college lecturer accused of raping student

The Supreme Court has stayed a Kerala High Court order which had upheld the reinstatement to service of a rape accused college lecturer who had married the victim [The Manager, Ansar Arabic College v. P Shamsudheen]..A Bench of Justices R Subhash Reddy and Justice Hrishikesh Roy issued notice to the accused on a plea filed by the manager of Ansar Arabic College, challenging order of the Kerala High Court."Issue notice. Pending further orders, there shall be stay of implementation of directions for reinstatement," the Court said..The lecturer who was already married with children was accused of raping a student. Subsequently, he had contracted a second marriage with that student.In a separate proceeding, the rape case against him was quashed by the Kerala High Court on the ground that he had married the victim. Meanwhile, the management of the college initiated action against him on charges including the rape allegations, tarnishing the image of the college and entering into second marriage without permission from the government. Besides, there was also a charge that he had applied for leave without allowance for five years from June 2, 2011 for seeking employment abroad and entered on leave without getting permission from the authorities concerned.He was dismissed from service on the basis of the above after an enquiry. The respondent then approached the Calicut University Appellate Tribunal, against the dismissal order.The tribunal set aside the dismissal order passed by the college observing the enquiry proceedings were vitiated as reasonable opportunity was not given to the respondent to defend himself.It was then asked to conduct the enquiry afresh. The respondent was, however, dismissed after the second inquiry too on two charges:- proceeding for leave without permission;- tarnishing the credibility of the institute which amounted to misconduct.The lecturer once again approached the Calicut University Appellate Tribunal which set aside all the charges held against the respondent lecturer and directed the college to reinstate him back in service.With regard to the first charge, it was found that a penalty of warning/ censure had already been imposed and a second penalty based on the same charge would be tantamount to double jeopardy. As regards the charge of tarnishing the image of the college, the tribunal held that the management did not take any steps to prove the same. Based on the above, he was ordered to be reinstated. The High Court upheld the same prompting the present appeal before the top court. .The appeal filed through advocate A Karthik contended that the action of censure/ warning taken on the basis of administrative action cannot be compared with that of punishment imposed by way of formal enquiry as per the Service Rules."In the administrative action, the employee is reminded about his omissions, however in a formal enquiry like a disciplinary enquiry, the employee is proceeded against for his misconduct. The same won’t amount to double jeopardy as the ambit of both of these are different," the petition said..Regarding the charge of tarnishing of image, it was pointed out that the tribunal and High Court had arrived the conclusion by resorting to the fact that management had not proved the same based on evidence.However, the plea contended that an enquiry officer performs a quasi-judicial function and must arrive at a conclusion that there had been a preponderance of probability to prove the charges.Moreover the quashing of the criminal case by the High Court was based on extraneous variables and the occurrence remains and offence is not obliterated."The quashing of offences on the basis of affidavit of De-facto Complainant cannot be an embargo to proceed with disciplinary proceeding," the petition stated.The Court while seeking the response of the lecturer stayed the order of reinstatement.Senior Advocate V Chitambaresh appeared for the petitioner. .[Read Order]