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PETITIONER: MOHAMMAD ABDUL SALAM KHAN

       Vs.

RESPONDENT: SARFARAZ AHMAD KHAN & OTHERS

DATE OF JUDGMENT05/03/1975

BENCH: KRISHNAIYER, V.R. BENCH: KRISHNAIYER, V.R. RAY, A.N. (CJ) MATHEW, KUTTYIL KURIEN GUPTA, A.C.

CITATION:  1975 AIR 1064            1975 SCR  (3) 860  1975 SCC  (1) 669

ACT: U.P. Town Areas Act, (II of 1914) s. 6K--Scope of--Dismissed Government servant--If could be elected as Chairman of  Town Area Committee--Dismissal--Meaning of. Punjab Police Rules--Rule 16(2)(iii)--Scope  of--Publication of dismissal in Police Gazette--Effect of.

HEADNOTE: Section  6-K  of  the U.P. Town Areas Act  provides  that  a person  I  notwithstanding that he is  otherwise  qualified, shall  be disqualified for being chosen as, and for being  a member  or  Chairman  of a Committee if he  is  a  dismissed servant   of  a  local  authority,  the  State  or   Central Government and is debarred from re-employment therein.  Rule 16(2)  (iii)  of  the Punjab Police Rules,  which  apply  to respondent  No. 1 at the relevant time, states that  when  a police  ,officer is convicted judicially and  dismissed.  or dismissed  as  a  result  of  a  departmental  enquiry,  the conviction and dismissal and its cause shall be published in the Police Gazette.  In other cases of dismissal when it  is desired  to ensure that the officer dismissed shall  not  be re-employed   elsewhere,  a  full  descriptive  roll.   with particulars   of   the  punishments.  shall  be   sent   for publication in the Police Gazette The  first  respondent, a dismissed  police  constable.  was elected  as  Chairman  ,of the  Town  Area  Committee.   The appellant.  who  was the defeated  candidate,  assailed  the election   of   the  respondent.   The   Election   Tribunal constituted  under  the U.P. Town Areas Act  set  aside  the election  and declared the appellant as the Chairman.  In  a writ  petition  under Art. 226, a single Judge of  the  High Court  affirmed  the order of the Tribunal  as  regards  the election  of  the respondent No. 1 but in  relation  to  the relief directed against the declaration of the appellant  as Chairman. A  Division  Bench of the High Court allowed the  appeal  of respondent   No.  1  holding  that  s.  6-K  spoke  of   two components,  namely,  (a) dismissal and (b)  being  debarred from  re-employment and since the second ingredient was  not present  in the order of termination against the  constable,

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the formula for disQualification was not fulfilled. Allowing the appeal, HELD  : (1) There is no escape from the conclusion that  the first  respondent was punished under the former part  of  r. 16(2)  (iii)  and  incurred the extreme  wrath  of  the  law including disbarment from re-employment.  Logically.  there- fore.  he suffered disqualification under s. 6-K of the  Act and  the Tribunal. in removing him from Chairmanship,  acted legally. [866 F] Section 7 of the Police Act speaks of dismissal as ’a single category  of  punishment,  not as two twigs  from  the  same branch, that is, dismissal  without and with embargo on  re- entry  into  State service.  When s. 7 uses  the  expression ’dismissal’, it must be deemed to have conveyed the official semantics attached to that expression, namely, removal  from service  plus a ban on reemployment by the State.  The  non- enumeration  of ’removal’ as a distinct form  of  punishment does  not divest the appointing authority  from  exercising, subject  to  legal restrictions, the power  to  remove  from service  without inflicting the more serious  punishment  of dismissal. [864 C; F] 861 (2)  The   words   ’dismissals  and   ’removal’   have   one distinction,  namely,  that  the  former  disqualifies  from future  employment  while the latter does  not.   Therefore, dismissal is removal with a prohibition super-added. [864 H; 865 D], Khem  Chand v. Union of India [1958] S.C.R. 1080,  1089  and Shyamlal’s case, A.I.R. 1954 S.C. 369, 374, refer-red to. (3)  (a)  "Dismissal"  removes the man from his  office  and super-adds  debarment  from re-employment.  Such  being  its meaning  in the Indian Constitution, in the  relevant  rules which  have been in force in this country over the  decades; "dismissal" has to be understood, as punishment imposed upon the constable in this case, as one which embodies the latent penalty of disability from being. re-employed. [866 B] (b)  Rule  16(2)  (iii) does not state "in  other  cases  of dismissal" the bat against re-employment operates only where there  is publication in the Police Gazette to that  effect. Dismissal, as such, carries with it this additional  penalty in  both classes of cases but in the first category  covered by  the rule, publication is a duty cast upon the  authority while in the second category the authority is left with  the option  to  publish or not to publish.   If  the  dismissing authority  desires  to ensure itself that  unwittingly  some other  department may not employ the dismissed official,  it may,  by way of abundant caution, resort to  publication  of the punishment in the Police Gazette.  The language is clear that  to ensure that the officer dismissed shall not be  re- employed the concerned authority shall send for  publication the relevant particulars.  Not that without such publication a right to re-employment inheres in the dismissed  official, but  that  to make sure that any unknowing slip may  not  be committed by another department. the dismissing officer  may take  care  to  forward the particulars  of  punishment  for proper   publication.   It  is  enabling,  so  far  as   the dismissing   authority   is  concerned,   and   is   legally unnecessary   to   spell  the  two-in-one   punishment   of’ dismissal. [866 C-E.] ARGUMENTS For the Appellant : From a plain reading of s. 6-K of the U.P. Town Areas Act it is clear that if a man is dismissed from service of a  local authority, Central Government or State Government by way  of punishment and is debarred from re-employment thereunder, he

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cannot  contest  the election for the Chairman of  the  Town Area  Committee.  From a plain reading of s. 6-K it  becomes clear that the intention of the legislature in enacting this law  was  that  the persons who  have  been  dismissed  from service  by  way  of punishment will not  be  qualified  for election  to,  the post of Chairman.  Town  Area  Committee. This  section contemplates only such dismissed servants  who have  been dismissed from service by way of  Punishment  for misconduct. and Indiscipline. For Respondent Vol.  I Respondent no.  1 was removed from the Delhi Police  Service and was not a dismissed servant within the meaning of s. 6-K of  the U.P. Town Area Act.  The words  ’dismissed  servant’ used in s. 6-K in that Act were used in a broader sense  and meant  a servant whose services were terminated.  The  words ’and  is  debarred from re-employment therein used  in  that section  clearly indicate that the election petitioner  will have  to  prove that the services of respondent No.  1  were terminated and he was debarred from re-employment.   Section 7 of the, Indian Police Act and r. 16(2)(iii) of the  Punjab Police Rules were applicable to Delhi. If  a Police Officer is convicted by a Court of law  and  is dismissed  as  a  result  of  the  departmental  enquiry  in consequence of corrupt practices, such dismissal would  ipso facto mean dismissal by way of punishment.  However. if  the termination  of service was on account of any other  reason, then  if die authority terminating the services desires.  to ensure  that the officer dismissed shall not be  re-employed elsewhere,  a full descriptive roll with particulars of  the punishment  hall  be  sent for  publication  in  the  Police Gazette in the present case the ser- 862 vices   of  the  respondent  no.   1  were   terminated   in departmental inquiries, the dismissal was not on account  of corrupt  practice  failing  under  the  first  part  of   r. 16(2)(iii)  of the Punjab Police Rules.  Secondly there  was no publication in the    Police Gazette.  It must  therefore follow that it was a case of removal and not dismissal.

JUDGMENT: CIVIL  APPELLATE  JURISDICTION : Civil Appeal  No.  1200  of 1974. Appeal  by special leave from the judgment and  order  dated the  4th April, 1973 of the Allahabad High Court in  Special Appeal No. 34 of 1973. R.   K. Jain, N. R. Choudhary, Rajesh Prasad Singh and K. K. Mohan,    for the appellant. J.   P. Goyal and G. S. Chatterjee for respondent No. 1. The Judgment of the Court was delivered by KRISHNA  IYER,  J.A single legal issue presents  itself  for ,solution in this appeal.  The question is whether a  public servant dismissed for misconduct is not ipso jure  disbarred from  employment  under  the  State.   If  ’yes’,  the   1st respondent   is  ineligible  for  the  public.   office   of Chairmanship  of Town Area Bugirasi from where, he has  been removed on the ground of dismissal from government  service, resulting  in  the eruption of this  election  dispute.   If ’no’, restoration to the lost office inevitably follows. The   appellant   and  1st  respondent   were   rivals   for Chairmanship  of  Town Area Bugrasi in U.P.  The  latter,  a dismissed  police constable, was returned by the  electorate and  the  former,  chagrined  by  the  defeat,  successfully petitioned the Election Tribunal.

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The Ground The  appellant and the 1st respondent were two of the  three candidates  for  Chairmanship of the Town Area  of  Bugrasi. The  1st respondent secured the highest number of votes  and was  declared elected by the Returning  Officer.   Thereupon the  appellant moved the statutory tribunal by  an  election petition which was allowed on the seore of  disqualification for being chosen as Chairman by virtue of S. 6 K of the U.P. Town  Areas  Act  (Act II of  1914).   The  disqualification stemmed  from dismissal of the 1st respondent  on  September 26,  1963  from the Delhi Police Force.  When  the  Election Tribunal  set  aside  the  1st  respondent’s  election   and declared  the  appellant  as  the  Chairman,  the   unseated candidate  invoked the writ jurisdiction of the High  Court. The learned Single Judge who heard the petition affirmed the order  of the Tribunal substantially but in relation to  the relief directed against the declaration of the appellant  as Chairman, the order was vacated.  That question was left  to be  decided afresh in the light of certain  observations  of the learned Judge.  Dissatisfied’ by the result, of both the appellant and the 1st respondent filed Writ Appeals before a Division  Bench  of  the  High  Court  which  ended  in  the allowance, of the claim of the 1st respondent to be Chairman and consequential dismissal of the appeal of the other.  The aggrieved appellant has, therefore, come up to this Court by special  leave for relief based on the construction  of  two slightly ambiguous rules having some impact on this  village election.                             863 Before  opening  a political chapter, respondent No.  1  had ended   his  official  career  as  police  constable   under dismissal order dated September 26, 1963               "Constable  No.  3048 Sarfraz  Ahmad  Khaa  is               dismissed  from the forenoon of  25-9-1963  of               having  been  in illicit  relation  with  Mrs.               Chatterjee  and her daughter.  The conduct  of               the    constable   is   most    reprehensible,               adulterous  and unworthy of a  Police  Officer               who  is supposed to protect the  Society  from               such vices." He  ran  for Panchayat Chairmanship and won,  defeating  the appellant  and  the  2nd  respondent.   The  disability  for election in the present instance is said to spring from  the dismissal  of the 1st respondent from government service  as aforesaid. Let us examine the relevant legal texts.  The pertinent part of   6-K,   relied   on   by   the   appellant   as    fatal disqualification, reads               "6-K.    Disqualification  for   members   and               Chairman-               A person notwithstanding that he is  otherwise               qualified,  shall  be disqualified  for  being               chosen as, and for being, a member or Chairman               of a Committee, if he-               (a)   is  a  dismissed  servant  of  a   local               authority, the State or Central Government and               is debarred from re-employment therein, Is  the  contesting respondent ’a dismissed servant  of  the State   Government  and  is  debarred   from   re-employment therein’?   That  is the question.  The statute is  of  1914 vintage,  but  amended  from time to time, and  we  have  to interpret   it  in  the  light  of  legal   provisions   and constitutional developments.  Does ’dismissal’ automatically spell, ’disbarment from re-employment’?  The argument  which weighed  with  the High Court is that s. 6-K speaks  of  two

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components  (a)  dismissal;  (b)  and  being  debarred  from reemployment.   The second ingredient is not present in  the terminal order against the constable and so the formula  for disqualification is not fulfilled. We  are  not  impressed  with  this  dualism.  If  dismissal simpliciter carries within it the ban on re-employment as  a necessaryjural incident then both the elements are  present implicitly in theorder.  It  is not as if  the  interdict against re-employment should beseparately  sated in  the rule  or order if by force of law an effective bar  in  that behalf can be read into the order cashiering the  constable. So we are thrown back on the order itself which, admittedly, is silent on prohibition of reemployment. Counsel  for the contestant, Shri Goyal, strenuously  argued that  he  Police  Act  and the  relevant  rules  bearing  on disciplinary  action  ire  telling and must  be  treated  as decisive.  Brushing aside the ripples of confusion raised in the  course  of  arguments about the  source  of  power  for framing these rules-no party, at any stage, has challenged 864 the vires of the rules-we may reproduce r. 16(2)(iii)  which governs   the situation.  Before that, a glance at s.  7  of the Police Act :               Subject  to the provisions of Article  311  of               the  Constitution  and to such  rules  as  the               State  Government may from time to  time  make               under this Act, the Inspector General,  Deputy               Inspectors-General,   Assistant    Inspectors-               General   and  District  Superintendents,   of               Police  may  at any time dismiss,  suspend  or               reduce  any police-officer of the  subordinate               ranks   whom  they  shall  think   remiss   or               negligent  in  the discharge of  his  duty  or               unfit for the same." It  is  clear  that s. 7 speaks of  dismissal  as  a  single category  of  punishment,  not as two twigs  from  the  same branch i.e., dismissal without and with embargo on  re-entry into State service.  It may, however, be noticed that  there is  no  specific  reference  to  removal  from  service,   a recognised form of punishment sanctified by the Constitution Acts,  including  Art. 311.  Since s. 7  expressly  subjects itself  to  the  paramount law of  the  Constitution  it  is obvious that the power to remove is not eroded and vests  in the  appointing authority apart from the power  to  dismiss. Indeed, the Central and State rules regulating  disciplinary control, all over the country, have, for a long period, made distinction  between  dismissal  and  removal,  the   former carrying the more injurious incident of removal plus refusal of    future   re-employment.    Anyone   conversant    with disciplinary  control of government servants in  India  will agree that this fundamental difference between mere  removal and  dismissal  exists.  Art. 311 enumerates  dismissal  and removal as two different punishments, one more serious  than the  other.  It is perfectly plain that, understood in  this environment   of  legal  control  of   government   servants prevalent  historically in this country, s. 7 of the  Police Act, when it uses the expression ’dismissal, must be  deemed to  have  conveyed the official semantics attached  to  that expression,  viz., removal from set-vice plus a ban  on  re- employment  by the State.  The non-enumeration of  ,removal’ as  a  distinct  form  of punishment  does  not  divest  the appointing  authority  from  exercising,  subject  to  legal restrictions  the  power  to  remove  from  service  without inflicting the more serious Punishment of dismissal. The expressions ’dismissal’ and ’removal’ look alike for the

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laity  but  in  law they have  acquired  technical  meanings sanctified  by long usage, in Service Rules.  In Khem  Chand v. Union of India(1) this Court observed :               ".. the expressions ’dismissed’, ’removed’ and               ’reduced’  in rank’ are technical words  taken               from the service rules where they, are used to               denote   the   three   major   categories   of               punishment’." As  been rightly pointed out in a recent book(2), the  words ’dismissal’  and ’removal’ have one distinction, viz.,  that the former dis- (1)  [1958] S.C.R. 1080,1089. (2)  The Civil Servant under the Law and the Constitution-by Dr.  N.  Narayanan Nair-The Academy of  Legal  Publications, Trivandrum-1, Kerala (1973). 865 qualifies from future employment while the latter does  not. Likewise,   there  is  reference  to  this  distinction   in Shyamlal’s Case(1) wherein it was said:               "The  position, therefore, is that both  under               the rules and according to the last  mentioned               decision of the Judicial Committee (I.M. Lal’s               Case: AIR 1948 PC 121) there is no distinction               between a dismissal and a removal except  that               the former disqualifies from future employment               while  the  latter does not... and it  may  be               safely  be  taken, for reasons  stated  above,               that....  removal and dismissal stand  on  the               same  footing except as to future  employment.               In  this  sense removal is but  a  species  of               dismissal." Rule  49  of the Civil Services (Classification,  Control  & Appeal) Rules,.1930 provides inter alia :               "Removal is termination of service which  does               not   disqualify   from   future   employment.               Dismissal  is  ;removal  from  service   which               ordinarily  disqualifies from  future  employ-               ment." It  follows that ’dismissal’ is ’removal with a  prohibition super-added’. Against  this  background,  here is r. 16(2)  (iii)  of  the Punjab  Police Rules which applied during the relevant  time to the 1st respondent:               "16(2)(iii).    When  a  Police   Officer   is               convicted   judicially   and   dismissed,   or               dismissed  as  a  result  of  a   departmental               enquiry,  in consequence of corrupt  practice,               the  conviction  and dismissal and  its  cause               shall be published in the Police Gazette.   In               other  cases of dismissal, when it is  desired               to ensure that the Officer dismissed shall not               be  re-employed elsewhere, a full  descriptive               roll,  with  particulars of  the  punishments,               shall  be sent for publication in  the  Police               Gazette". The submission made with some attractiveness, by Shri  Goyal receives  verbal  support  from the text of  the  rule.   It speaks of a police officer being dismissed in consequence of ’corrupt  practice’ in which case there is a mandate to  the State  Government that ’its cause shall be published in  the Police   Gazette’.   ’In  other  cases  of  dismissal’   the provision   for  publication  in  the  Police   Gazette   is facultative.   Counsel  spins out the argument that  if  ’in other  cases of dismissal’ the authority intends to  inflict the  additional penalty of non-reemployment, it should  also

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publish  the  punishment  in the  Police  Gazette.   In  the present case there is no indication of any such  publication and  so the dismissal does not carry with it the  forbidding factor  regarding  re-employment.  Read with s.  6-K,  which refers  to  dismissal  together  with  debarment  from   re- employment,  the conclusion is sought to be drawn  that  the 1st respondent’s case does not attract the  disqualification in s. 6-K. (1) A.I.R. 1954 S.C. 369, 374. 866 We do not agree.The  reasons  are two-fold.  As  earlier explained,every ’dismissal’ hasa   double    consequence understood in its contextual connotation.It removes  the man   from   his  office  and   superadds   debarment   from reemployment.   Such  being  its  meaning  in   the   Indian Constitution, in the relevant rules which have been in force in  the country over the decades and indeed has become  part of  our officialese, we have to understand the dismissal  as punishment  imposed upon the constable in this case  as  one which  embodies the latent penalty of disability from  being re-employed. Secondly, even r. 16(2) (iii) carefully scanned, refuses  to yield the helpful inference drawn from it by counsel for the 1st respondent.  That rule does not state ’in other cases of dismissal’ the bar against re-employment operatesonly where there is publication in the Police gazette to that effect. Dismiss al, as such, carries with it this additional penalty inboth classes  of cases but in the first category covered  by  the rule,publication  is  a duty cast  upon  the  authority while in the second type of cases the authority is lift with the option to publish or not to publish.  If the  dismissing authority  desires  to ensure itself that  unwittingly  some other  department may not employ the dismissed official,  he may,  by way of abundant caution,-resort to  publication  of the punishment in the Police Gazette.  The language is clear that to ensurethat  the  officer  dismissed  shall  not  be reemployed the concernedauthority     shall    send     for publication the relevant particulars.Not   that   without such  publication  a right to re-employment inheres  in  the dismissed official, but that to make sure that any unknowing slip  may  not  be  committed  by  another  department,  the dismissing officer may take care to forward the  particulars of punishment for proper publication.  It is enabling so far as  the  dismissing authority is concerned  and  is  legally unnecessary to spell the two-in-one punishment of dismissal. In  this  view  of the matter there is no  escape  from  the conclusion  that the 1st respondent was punished  under  the former  part  of r. 16 (2) (iii) and  incurred  the  extreme wrath  of the law including disbarment  from  re-employment. Logically therefore he suffered disqualification under s. 6- K  of  the  Act  and the  Tribunal,  in  removing  him  from Chairmanship, acted legally. No  other  point has been urged before us and  therefore  we allow  the  appeal  and affirm the  learned  Single  Judge’s judgment.   In the circumstances of the case we direct  that the parties will bear their costs in this Court.  The  costs of the appellant in the courts below will be paid by the 1st respondent. P.B.R. Appeal allowed. 867