High Court of Punjab and HaryanaCWP/7916/2023allowed

Narender Kumar v. State Of Haryana And Others

2025-12-03Mr. Justice Sandeep Moudgil13 pages

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( "21. The meaning of the expression 'honourable acquittal' came up for consideration before this Court in Management of Reserve Bank of India, New Delhi v. Bhopal Singh Panchal, 1994(1) S.C.T. 505 : (1994)1 SCC 541. In that case, this Court has considered the impact of Regulation 46(4) dealing with honourable acquittal by a criminal court on the disciplinary proceedings. In that context, this Court held that the mere acquittal does not entitle an employee to reinstatement in service, the acquittal, it was held, has to be honourable. The expressions 'honourable acquittal', 'acquitted of blame', 'fully exonerated' are unknown to the Code of Criminal Procedure or the Penal Code, which are coined by judicial pronouncements. It is difficult to define precisely what is meant by the expression 'honourably acquitted'. When the accused is acquitted after full consideration of prosecution evidence and that the prosecution had miserably failed to prove the charges levelled against the accused, it can possibly be said that the accused was honourably acquitted" /;

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( $ "16. However, adverting to the criminal proceeding initiated against the appellant, we would first like to point out that the complainant did not support the case of the prosecution as he failed to identify the assailants and further admitted that the contents of the Section 161 of Cr.P.C. statement were not disclosed to him and his signatures were obtained on a blank sheet of paper by the Investigation Officer. Further, Sajjan Singh, who was an eye9witness of the case, who was also injured, had failed to identify the assailants. Both the witnesses were declared hostile on the request of the prosecution. The learned Additional Sessions Judge, Bhiwani held that the prosecution case has not been able to prove in any way the allegations against the appellant.

Thus, the learned Judge held that the prosecution had miserably failed to prove the charges leveled against the appellant in the criminal proceedings. Therefore, we are in agreement with the findings and judgment of the learned Additional Sessions Judge and are of the opinion that the acquittal of the accused from the criminal case was an honourable acquittal."

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' (# "It was submitted that the departmental proceedings and the criminal case are based on identical and similar (verbatim) set of facts and evidence. The appellant has been honourably acquitted by the competent Court on the same set of facts, evidence and witness and, therefore, the dismissal order based on same set of facts and evidence on the departmental side is liable to be set aside in the interest of justice."

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"The legal position is fairly well settled that an order of termination of a temporary employee or probationer or even of tenure employee, simpliciter without casting any stigma may not be interfered with by court. But the court is not debarred from looking to the attendant circumstances, namely, the cir9 cumstances prior to the issuance of order of termination to find out whether the alleged inefficiency really was the motive for the order of termination or formed the foundation for the same order. If the court comes to a conclusion that the order was, in fact, the motive, then obviously the order would not be interfered with, but if the court comes to a conclusion that the so called inef9 ficiency was the real foundation for passing of order of termination, then ob9 viously such an order would be held to be penal in nature and must be in9 terfered with since the appropriate procedure has not been followed." $ % 2"

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( "8. The law is settled that non9arbitrariness is an essential facet of Article 14 pervading the entire realm of State action governed by Article 14. It has come to be established, as a further corollary, that the audi alteram partem facet of natural justice is also a requirement of Article 14, for, natural justice is the antithesis of arbitrariness. In the sphere of public employment, it is well settled that any action taken by the employer against an employee must be fair, just and reasonable which are components of fair treatment. The conferment of absolute power to terminate the services of an employee is antithesis to fair, just and reasonable treatment. This aspect was exhaustively considered by a Constitution Bench of this Court in Delhi Transport Corporation v. D.T.C. Mazdoor Congress, reported in AIR 1991 Supreme Court 101 : 1991(1) S.C.T. 675.

9. In order to impose procedural safeguards, this Court has read the requirement of natural justice in many situations when the statute is silent on this point. The approach of this Court in this regard is that omission to impose the hearing requirement in the statute under which the impugned action is being taken does not exclude hearing 9 it may be implied from the nature of the power 9 particularly when the right of a party is affected adversely.

To arrive at such a finding necessarily enquiry will have to be held and in holding such an enquiry the person whose appointment is under enquiry will have to be issued to him. If notice is not given to him then it is like playing Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark, that is, if the employee concerned whose rights are affected, is not given notice of such a proceeding and a conclusion is drawn in his absence, such a conclusion would not be just, fair or reasonable as noticed by this Court in D.T.C. Mazdoor Sabha's case" *0

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' "51. Summarising the above discussion, this Court holds : a. In India the judicial trend has always been to record reasons, even in administrative decisions, if such decisions affect anyone prejudicially.

b. A quasi9judicial authority must record reasons in support of its conclusions.

c. Insistence on recording of reasons is meant to serve the wider principle of justice that justice must not only be done it must also appear to be done as well.

d. Recording of reasons also operates as a valid restraint on any possible arbitrary exercise of judicial and quasi9judicial or even administrative power.

e. Reasons reassure that discretion has been exercised by the decision maker on relevant grounds and by disregarding extraneous considerations.

f. Reasons have virtually become as indispensable a component of a decision making process as observing principles of natural justice by judicial, quasi9judicial and even by administrative bodies. g. Reasons facilitate the process of judicial review by superior Courts. h. The ongoing judicial trend in all countries committed to rule of law and constitutional governance is in favour of reasoned decisions based on relevant facts. This is virtually the life blood of judicial decision making justifying the principle that reason is the soul of justice. i. Judicial or even quasi9judicial opinions these days can be as different as the judges and authorities who deliver them. All these decisions serve one common purpose which is to demonstrate by reason that the relevant factors have been objectively considered. This is important for sustaining the litigants' faith in the justice delivery system.

j. Insistence on reason is a requirement for both judicial accountability and transparency.

k. If a Judge or a quasi9judicial authority is not candid enough about his/her decision making process then it is impossible to know whether the person deciding is faithful to the doctrine of precedent or to principles of incrementalism.

l. Reasons in support of decisions must be cogent, clear and succinct. A pretence of reasons or 'rubber9stamp reasons' is not to be equated with a valid decision making process.

m. It cannot be doubted that transparency is the sine qua non of restraint on abuse of judicial powers. Transparency in decision making not only makes the judges and decision makers less prone to errors but also makes them subject to broader scrutiny. (See David Shapiro in Defence of Judicial Candor (1987) 100 Harward Law Review 7319737).

n. Since the requirement to record reasons emanates from the broad doctrine of fairness in decision making, the said requirement is now virtually a component of human rights and was considered part of Strasbourg Jurisprudence. See (1994) 19 EHRR 553, at 562 para 29 and Anya v. University of Oxford, 2001 EWCA Civ 405, wherein the Court referred to Article 6 of European Convention of Human Rights which requires, "adequate and intelligent reasons must be given for judicial decisions".

o. In all common law jurisdictions judgments play a vital role in setting up precedents for the future. Therefore, for development of law, requirement of giving reasons for the decision is of the essence and is virtually a part of "Due Process"."

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Sham Whether speaking/reasoned :Yes/No Whether reportable :Yes/No