ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court reiterated on Tuesday that the major penalty of dismissal from service cannot be awarded to a civil servant before conducting a regular inquiry or providing opportunity of being heard since it violates the principles of natural justice.

“In case of imposing a major penalty, the principle of natural justice requires that a regular inquiry should be conduc­ted and opportunity of defence as well as personal hearing should be provided to the civil servant,” Justice Aqeel Ahmed Abba­si observed in a six-page order he authored.

Justice Abbasi emphasised that in cases involving public funds, extra caution and due care is required to be obse­rved to prove the charge of embezzlement or misappropriation whereas proper inqu­iry needs to be conducted in a fair and transparent manner to ensure that the public funds, so misappropriated, could be retrieved and the civil servant involved in such offence, be punished accordingly.

He was a member of the Justice Musarrat Hilali-led bench that had taken up Malik Muhammad Ramzan’s appeal against the order of the Punjab Service Tribunal, Lahore, issued on Jan 24, 2022.

The controversy concerns the dismissal from service by the District Coordination Officer/District Collector Mianwali who proceeded against Malik Muhammad Ramzan under Punjab Employees Efficiency, Discipline and Accountability Act, 2006 (PEEDA) on the charges of fraud and embezzlement of funds. Malik Ramzan had allegedly raised the amounts of cheques through forgery after getting them signed by the relevant authorities.

Reinstatement of civil servant ordered, along with fresh inquiry

The petitioner filed departmental ap­­p­eal before departmental authorities, but the appeal was rejected on Nov 11, 2016. He filed a revision petition, which was also rejected on March 2, 2018 and against that order the petitioner preferred an ap­­peal before the tribunal. The tribunal, however, dismissed the plea on Jan 24, 2022. The petitioner finally approached the Su­­p­­reme Court against the tribunal’s order.

Loopholes

The apex court in its judgement held that the allegations of embezzlement/misappropriation of funds by altering the amount in cheques, which were neither authored nor signed by the petitioner, were required to be proved with conclusive evidence by confronting the petitioner with specific details.

However, Justice Aqeel observed, no such exercise appears to have been taken, nor the cheques, which were allegedly altered by the petitioner, were sent to any handwriting expert for verification.

The judgement noted that the Investi­gating Officer (IO) and the complainant before the anti-corruption department was the same person i.e. Ghulam Mustafa Sheikh, who was also the author and signatory of the cheques, which were allegedly altered by the petitioner.

It appeared that no departmental action was taken against him, therefore, the bias of the IO and the possibility of false implication of the petitioner in the instant matter could not be ruled out, the judgement said.

The Supreme Court regretted that caution and due care had not been taken in the present case and the respondent department failed to even place on record the enquiry proceedings, nor could refer to any concrete material or confidence inspiring evidence against the petitioner.

Moreover, the petitioner was not given any opportunity of being heard whereas, a major penalty of dismissal from service has been imposed upon the petitioner without conducting any regular inquiry.

The apex court held that the judgments passed by the tribunal and the orders of the lower fora were contrary to law and violative of the principles of natural justice as no regular inquiry had been conducted while imposing major penalty of dismissal from service.

Reinstatement ordered

While accepting the appeal, the Supreme Court set aside the tribunal’s order with a direction to the respondents to reinstate the petitioner into service.

The case, however, was remanded back to the departmental authority to conduct de novo inquiry into the allegations levelled against the petitioner while providing him sufficient opportunity of being heard in terms of Sections 9 and 10 of the PEEDA.

The SC expected that such inquiry would be concluded preferably within a period of three months from the date of receipt of this order, the judgement said.

Published in Dawn, August 6th, 2025