The Hindu : Can the judges' panel summon aided college staff?

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Jan 12, 2004

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Can the judges' panel summon aided college staff?

CHENNAI, JAN. 11. One of the issues lawyers familiar with cases relating to the dismissal of State Government employees have raised is whether the panel of former judges, who heard representations of those dismissed/suspended from service under the Tamil Nadu Essential Services Maintenance Act, can summon staff of aided private educational institutions.

On September 15, Justice K. Govindarajan of the Madras High Court, setting aside the suspension of two lecturers of the Voorhees College at Vellore, said that though Section 7 of the ESMA before amendment had provisions for disciplinary proceedings against all employees, the one amended by a subsequent ordinance did not provide for such an action. ``...The new Section 7 is made applicable only to Government servants.''

While one of the panel judges merely recorded the High Court findings and said no further order need be passed on the representation by a suspended employee of an aided college, another judge, who discussed the matter in detail, ``took a lenient view'' while setting aside the dismissal of another employee.

The two staff members of the Kandasamy Kandar's College at Velur, Namakkal, were booked for the same offence, their names clubbed in the first information report (Crime number 293/03) and included in the list of punished employees and forwarded to the panel, which sent summons to them, directing them to appear for an enquiry.

In the end, one panel judge said, ``There is no need for considering the representation at this stage in view of an interim stay on the proceedings granted by the Madras High Court.'' However, another judge dealt with the issue in detail, set aside a non-existent dismissal order and imposed three increment cuts.

In another case, one of the panel judges passed severe strictures on an aided college lecturer, for sending the High Court order by post and not appearing for the enquiry. Though the judge accepted the settled legal position, he observed: ``The petitioner had no courtesy to come and represent his case in spite of receipt of summons. The panel judge has got every right to bring him under coercion, if he feels necessary. By applying judicial restraint, I do not want to adopt coercive method to produce him before me, since the conduct of the petitioner would show that he is a lecturer without decency. If the petitioner is allowed to continue to teach students, the panel judge is afraid, their (students) conduct may also be in equation with that of the petitioner. With these observations, I hold that no action need be taken against the petitioner, in the light of the verdict of the Madras High Court.''

The judge also deemed it fit to mark a copy of the order to the Vellore bishop, whose diocese was managing the college.

He asked the bishop ``to have an eye on the lecturer.''

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