Institute of Legal and Management Studies

The Supreme Court on Monday (October 27) set aside the 37-year-old dismissal of a Railway Travelling Ticket Examiner (TTE), holding that the disciplinary findings were perverse and unsupported by evidence. The employee, who passed away during the prolonged litigation, will now have all consequential benefits released to his legal heirs.

A bench of Justices Sanjay Karol and Prashant Kumar Mishra set aside the Bombay High Court's Nagpur Bench order, allowing the appeal filed by the legal heirs of the deceased employee, restoring the earlier decision of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), which had quashed the dismissal order. The Court strongly criticized the Railway authorities' enquiry process and the Bombay High Court's subsequent approval of it.

It was alleged that the deceased employee-appellant was on duty on May 31, 1988, aboard the Dadar-Nagpur Express when the vigilance team conducted a surprise check. A Railway vigilance team levelled four charges against him, including demanding illegal gratification from passengers, possessing excess cash, failing to recover a fare difference, and forging a duty pass. Based on an Enquiry Officer's report, he was dismissed from service in 1996.

The CAT, however, in 2002 set aside the dismissal, citing the significant lapses in the prosecution's case, holding their enquiry to be perverse and unsustainable. The deceased employee was not afforded an opportunity to cross-examine the complainant, and other witnesses also didn't support the prosecution's case, rendering the findings to be perverse.

Aggrieved by the High Court's reversal of the CAT's decision, the employee moved the Supreme Court in 2019.

The judgment authored by Justice Mishra criticized the High Court for interfering with the well-reasoned order of the CAT, stating that “High Court has failed to take note of the legal position that when the findings of the Enquiry Officer were perverse basing on completely misleading of the materials produced before the Enquiry Officer, CAT was fully justified in setting aside the order of penalty.”

Endorsing the CAT's order, the Court observed “all the charges have not been found to be proved conclusively against the appellant and CAT, on the basis of the material on record, had rightly interfered with the penalty of dismissal from service against the appellant.”

“the incident happened on 31.05.1988, that is more than 37 years back. In the meanwhile, the delinquent employee has passed away. Therefore, while setting aside the impugned judgment of the High Court and restoring the order of CAT, we direct that all the consequential monetary benefits including pensionary benefits shall be released in favour of the appellants who are legal heirs of the deceased employee within a period of three months from today. Ordered accordingly.”, the Court added.

The appeal was allowed accordingly.

Cause Title: V.M. SAUDAGAR (DEAD) THROUGH LEGAL HEIRS VERSUS THE DIVISIONAL COMMERCIAL MANAGER, CENTRAL RAILWAY & ANR.

Citation : 2025 LiveLaw (SC) 1029

Click here to read/download the judgment

Appearance:

For Petitioner(s) :Ms. Kashmira Lambat, Adv. Mr. Kishor Lambat, Adv. Ms. Suja Joshi, Adv. M/S. Lambat And Associates, AOR

For Respondent(s) :Mr. Vikramjit Banerjee, A.S.G. Mr. Samir Singh Kachwaha, Adv. Mr. Rahul Mishra, Adv. Mr. Abhishek Singh, Adv. Mr. Aayush Ananad, Adv. Mr. Amrish Kumar, AOR