Delhi high court sets aside sacking of govt employees without probe

The Delhi high court today dismissed a petition of the city government seeking its approval for dismissing its staff in Trade and Tax Department after they were allegedly exposed for accepting money in a sting operation in Tihar jail.

A bench of justices Pradeep Nandrajog and MC Garg held that the government dismissed the employees without holding a proper inquiry on the basis of the sting operation carried out by a news channel.

The sting operation was done in 2005 by the TV news channel wherein the employees posted in Tihar Jail were shown accepting money from the persons lodged in jail and from those coming to meet them.

State government thereafter dismissed their services without holding any inquiry on the ground that the owners of the news channel refused to associate themselves with any inquiry in the matter.

The employees then approached the Central Administrative Tribunal which set aside the government order for dismissing them without holding an inquiry.

The state government then approached the High Court which refused to interfere with the tribunal's order.

"We are constrained to opine that the way the government has proceeded in dismissing the services of the employees by dispensing with the inquiry is contrary to rule of law which is the basis of good governance and constitutional obligation imposed upon the government," the court said.

The least which could have been done was to initiate an inquiry, place a copy of the cassette on the inquiry file, supply a copy of the cassette as telecast to the employees, give the employees an opportunity to explain, though not necessarily record all explanations that he gives," the court said.