Suspended Labour Court judge moves Supreme Court challenging disciplinary proceedings initiated against him by Madras High Court

A suspended Labour Court judge has approached the Supreme Court challenging the disciplinary action initiated against him by the Madras High Court for a decision rendered by him in a case concerning dismissal of an employee from service (S Nambirajan v. High Court of Madras). .The Supreme Court on Tuesday sought Madras High Court's response to the plea. The High Court order of July 2020 refusing to quash the charges framed against the petitioner-judge, was also stayed by the top court. .A Bench of Chief Justice of India SA Bobde and Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian was initially hesitant to entertain the matter. .However, counsel for the petitioner stated that past Supreme Court judgments lay down that "unless there are extraneous factors, initiation of disciplinary proceedings is wrong even if a judge makes errors on law." The counsel further highlighted that the Labour Court judge has been under suspension for more than a year..The Court then relented and issued notice in the matter. ."Issue notice returnable within four weeks. In the meantime, there shall ad-interim stay of the impugned order," the Supreme Court ordered..The genesis of the case lies in an industrial dispute which arose between a workman and his management after he was dismissed from service. On reference under Section 2A(2) of the Industrial Disputes Act, the matter went to 1st Additional Labour Court, Chennai and trial commenced. The judge then was another person and not the petitioner. .According to the petition, after recording the management's evidence, the petitioner's predecessor judge posted the case for arguments but the workman was not given any opportunity to adduce evidence.There was no judicial order to mark any document. No witness gave any evidence speaking to any document and making request to mark it, the plea said. .After the petitioner assumed charge, he found that there was no judicial order to mark any document and that the office had given marking to certain documents without any judicial order.He made a written note in the minutes stating that it appeared that the workman had not produce any evidence. He, therefore, directed the management to produce the original enquiry report.However, the management stated that the original enquiry report was not traceable. The petitioner thus concluded that certain exhibits were not admitted in evidence properly and consequently drew an adverse inference against the management..The dismissal of the worker was set aside and reinstatement was ordered with 25 percent back wages. However, the management appealed against the Labour Court order. .The High Court, in October 2016, stayed the order of the Labour Court while stating that Labour Court judge "deliberately over looked 105 pages of enquiry report..... Learned judge for some other unknown reason has given such a finding."The High Court, therefore, recommended departmental action against the petitioner. The Registry, thereafter, issued a show cause notice to the petitioner pursuant to the High Court order. .The petitioner then moved High Court seeking to expunge the remarks made against him in the October 2016 order. He further requested the administrative side of the High Court to end the proceedings against him.This plea was dismissed by a single-judge of the High Court in January 2019 stating that he would get a chance to present his case before the administrative side.The petitioner appealed to the Division Bench which allowed the appeal and ruled that the October 2016 order of the High Court will not bind the High Court on the administrative side. This decision was arrived at on the ground that the October 2016 order of the High Court was passed without giving the petitioner an opportunity to present his case..It is the appellant's case that despite the Division Bench order, charges were framed against the judge on administrative side and he was found guilty of having committed serious misconduct, favouritism and dereliction of duty thereby violating Rule 20 of the TB Goverment Servants Conduct rules, 1973..This charge memo was challenged again in the High Court by the petitioner but it was dismissed leading to the present appeal before the Supreme Court. .The petitioner has contended that the charge memo suffers from several infirmities, both substantive and procedural. It is his argument that the charge memo was issued at the instance of the administrative committee and the single -judge who had pronounced the order dismissing the petitioner's first petition against the disciplinary proceedings "is believed to be a member" of the administrative committee. ."It is submitted that the entire process culminating in the passing of the award by the Petitioner dated 28.06.2016 was in exercise of the powers which are vested in a Presiding Officer under Rule 39 of the Tamil Nadu Industrial Disputes Rules, 1958. It is submitted that enough opportunity was given to the parties to produce evidence," the petition states. .The matter will be heard next after 4 weeks. Senior Advocate V Prakash and advocate Senthil Jagadeesan appeared for the petitioner-judge. .[Read Order]