Calcutta High Court (Appellete Side)
Nisakar Chattopadhyay vs State Of West Bengal And Others on 15 June, 2016
Author: Sanjib Banerjee
Bench: Sanjib Banerjee
1 Serial No.49.
June 15, 2016.
SG WP 17643 (W) of 1999 with CAN 6019 of 2014 Nisakar Chattopadhyay
-versus-
State of West Bengal and others Mr Arunava Ghosh Ms Pompey Bose Mr Puspal Chakraborty ... for the petitioner.
Mr Bhaskar Mitra Mr R.M. Chattopadhyay ... for WBSEDCL.
The petitioner questions the propriety of an order of punishment as upheld in appeal, primarily on the ground that during the pendency of this challenge before this court from 1999, the petitioner has been acquitted in the connected criminal case. The petitioner claims the acquittal to be honourable.
Upon charges being levelled against the petitioner and a subordinate employee, an inquiry officer, who was not an employee of employer West Bengal State Electricity Board, was appointed. The appointment was under Regulation 61(b) read with Regulations 63 (c) and (d) of the West Bengal State Electricity Board Employees' Service Regulations. The inquiry officer was a retired IAS officer.
One of the grounds taken, both in the domestic appeal and at the very end of the final hearing, is that the inquiry officer was 2 appointed in contravention of Regulation 63(b) of the said Regulations. However, what the petitioner overlooked, while placing Regulation 63(b) of the said Regulations, was that the same had been amended and a second note had been included therein by an amendment of 1989 that permits persons other than officers of WBSEB to be appointed on contractual basis as inquiry officers.
The petitioner was charged with having accepted a bribe. A vigilance team along with other high officials laid a trap following a complaint of a consumer. The subordinate official, the other person who was charge-sheeted along with the petitioner, was found to have asked for the money on the instructions of the petitioner, who was the divisional engineer at the relevant point of time. The petitioner kept away from the inquiry proceedings at the initial state and did not participate therein while the management witnesses, including the complainant on the basis of whose complaint the entire matter arose, were examined and were available for cross- examination. The petitioner chose to attend the inquiry proceedings at a subsequent stage and the inquiry officer was indulgent in permitting the petitioner's plea of cross-examining the management witnesses. The complainant, however, chose not to come back for being cross-examined by the petitioner as the complainant spoke of threats to his life and sought an undertaking from the WBSEB (now, the West Bengal Electricity Distribution Company Ltd) for the employment of his son if anything untoward were to happen to him.
Ordinarily, since it was the petitioner who was at fault for not attending the inquiry proceedings at the initial stage, the inquiry officer may have been excused if the subsequent refusal by the complainant to be cross-examined was held against the petitioner 3 herein. But the exemplary manner in which the inquiry was conducted is evident from the fact that the inquiry officer ruled to strike out the oral evidence of the complainant before the inquiry officer. Notwithstanding such oral evidence being struck out, the inquiry officer observed that since the other evidence as to the incident was already before the officer and the charges levelled against the petitioner stood corroborated thereby, merely because the oral evidence of the complainant had to be struck out for his refusal to come later to be cross-examined, would not imply that the charges would fall or the disciplinary action would have no future.
Indeed, it is necessary to notice the exact words of the inquiry officer since the inquiry report is of such quality that many an industrious judge would be proud to claim authorship thereof:
"Coming now to the witnesses, Sri De Sarkar (P.W.1) has deposed on the facts stated in his complaint to O.S.D, Vigilance (P.W. 3) but he stayed away when the C.O appeared after a prolonged spell of absence and wanted to examine the witnesses for the prosecution. Several notices were served on him but he excused himself by raising the issue of threats to his life and an undertaking by the Board for employment of his son, should anything happen to him for giving evidence against Sri Chattopadhyaya. It is not for me to judge whether the plea put forward by Sri De Sarkar is genuine or not; so far as this enquiry is concerned, his earlier evidence in favour of the prosecution is stripped of its value because of his reluctance to face the C.O. It does not, however, follow that the whole prosecution has crumbled on this ground alone. There are other witnesses too and all of them of unimpeachable merit - who have strongly bolstered the charge levelled by the prosecution. The application for service connection over which the allegation arose has been proved by the Station Superintendent (P.W. 2). P. W. 9 who is the Personnel and Administrative Officer of the Corporate Vigilance Cell of the Board has testified that Sri De Sarkar came to him with his grievance and sought the assistance of the Vigilance Cell as he needed the connection badly. It was 4 P.W. 9 who took Sri De Sarkar to the OSD, vigilance cell. P. W. 11, the then Head Clerk, Vigilance Cell has stated that he wrote out the complaint (Ext.3) as told by Sri De Sarkar who signed on it after he was satisfied that his statement had been correctly recorded. O.S.D, Vigilance Cell (P.W. 3) has confirmed that it was the complaint (Ext. 3) submitted by Sri De Sarkar which prompted the authorities to draw up the plan for laying the trap on Sri Chattopadhaya (C.O). The notes that were used for the purpose of the trap were signed not only by P. W. 1 but also by O.S.D (P. W. 3), and an Executive Magistrate (P.W. 4) in the presence of S.D.P.O, Katwa (P.W. 7). The Ext.4 in which the particulars of these notes were recorded has also been proved by these witnesses. P. Ws 3, 4, 5 & 7 have deposed that the same bundle of notes was handed over to Sri De Sarkar who passed it on to Sri Roy Pratihar and who in his turn delivered it to his "Burra Saheb" (C.O) in pursuance of the previous stipulation. The O.S.D, Vigilance (P. W. 3), the Executive Magistrates (P. Ws 4 & 5), S.D.P.O, Katwa (P. W. 7) and other witnesses all bear out that they stormed into the chamber of D.E and brought out the signed notes from his hip pocket. Sri Chattopadhyay could not explain how he had come by the money. The overwhelming evidence of all these witnesses thus leaves no room for doubt that Sri Chattopadhaya acquired the amount of Rs. 12,000.00 found in his possession by way of illegal gratification from Sri Ratan De Sarkar."
The inquiry report, thereafter, considered the contention of the petitioner that the charges brought against the petitioner were a result of a conspiracy framed by the secretary of the Board. The inquiry officer considered such argument, found no basis thereto, particularly in the light of no corroborative evidence in such regard being presented by the delinquent officer. The inquiry report also referred to the presence of the sub-divisional police officer, the executive magistrate and other police officers of the Katwa Police Station who were present and were witnesses to the incident. The inquiry officer recorded the subsequent banal objections taken on behalf of the petitioner of even seeking to disown his signature in the seizure-list in the hope that the matter would be delayed by a 5 reference to a handwriting expert. The inquiry officer considered the entire conspectus of the matter and the evidence that was presented before him and rendered an opinion that the management had tendered witnesses who held high position in government and carried sufficient credibility. The inquiry report found that the primary charge levelled against the petitioner had been proved to the hilt.
The inquiry report of December 31, 1998 was forwarded to the petitioner by a letter of February 3, 1999 issued by the disciplinary authority. Indeed, all that the disciplinary authority was required to do was to call for the petitioner's comments against the inquiry report. The disciplinary authority, however, recorded his tentative agreement with the findings rendered by the inquiry officer and even indicated the punishment that he proposed. The letter of February 3, 1999 called upon the petitioner to respond to the inquiry report within 15 days of the receipt thereof.
True to the petitioner's conduct of seeking to delay the matter and wish away the inevitable, the petitioner did not respond to the inquiry report within the time permitted by the letter of February 3, 1999. The order of punishment of March 15, 1999 records that the letter was received by the petitioner's representative on February 5, 1999 and, thus, it was expected that the reply would be furnished by February 20, 1999. By a facsimile message of February 18, 1999 the petitioner sought further time to furnish his reply to the inquiry report and the disciplinary authority enlarged the time to receive the reply till March 5, 1999. However, no reply was forthcoming and the disciplinary authority proceeded to consider the report rendered by the inquiry officer and pronounced the order of punishment on March 15, 1999.
6The order of punishment speaks of the disciplinary authority having perused and considered the findings of the inquiry officer together with the evidence adduced at the inquiry. The disciplinary authority observed that the inquiry officer had "analysed and evaluated the evidence, duly relied upon and adduced during the inquiry with proper perspective before he recorded his views against the charged officer." The disciplinary authority indicated that he had gone through the evidence and recorded that he concurred with the findings of the inquiry officer. The petitioner was dismissed from service.
Against such order of March 15, 1999, the petitioner came to this court by way of WP 9128 (W) of 1999. Such petition was disposed of without interfering with the order of punishment or giving any credence to the petitioner's assertion of the order of punishment being passed without reference to the petitioner's detailed reply which was furnished to the disciplinary authority on March 22, 1999. So that the relevant order of this court of April 28, 1999 is not distorted, the same is quoted:
"The concerned authority is directed to consider and dispose of the petitioner's application after hearing the petitioner and by passing a reasoned order within six weeks from the date of communication of the order. Until disposal of the appeal, no further steps be taken against the petitioner. The writ petition stands disposed of."
In keeping with the order of this court, the appellate authority afforded a hearing to the petitioner, which may not have been warranted in the usual course. The appellate authority was a committee, described as the Standing Appellate Committee-I under Regulation 71(a) of the said Regulations. The Standing Appellate 7 Committee-I consisted of the chairman of the board of directors of the then WBSEB and two other persons as nominated by the chairman. The relevant regulation provides for the chairman of the Board to preside over the committee.
The appellate authority considered the order of punishment dated March 15, 1999 in the light of the inquiry report. The relevant committee making up the appellate authority observed that the initial ploy of the petitioner to ward off the disciplinary action on the ground of the pendency of the criminal matter was appropriately dealt with by the inquiry officer. The appellate order also recorded that the inquiry officer carefully chose the dates of the inquiry so that the petitioner was not inconvenienced or the dates of the inquiry did not clash with the dates of the criminal matter. The appellate authority was satisfied that the inquiry officer had provided adequate opportunity to the delinquent to present his case and indicate his defence. The appellate authority noted that the inquiry report had dealt at length with the non-appearance of PW-1 for cross-examination by the petitioner herein during the later stage of the inquiry.
The appellate authority also referred to the petitioner's allegation that the inquiry officer had been illegally appointed. The appellate authority found that the rules in place permitted a retired IAS officer to be appointed as an inquiry officer. The appellate committee referred to the evidence before the inquiry officer, including the exhibits, and came to a conclusion that the charges had been appropriately proved without any conjecture. As to the delinquent's apprehension that he had been framed by the vigilance team to settle old scores, the appellate committee recorded in the order that in response to a query in such regard the petitioner 8 herein "replied in the negative." The appellate order reveals that deliberations were held between the members of the committee before such committee upheld the punishment of dismissal from service. The appellate order was rendered on August 6, 1999 and is signed by one D. Mukherjee, described as OSD (Vig).
The petitioner submits that upon the person who had claimed that a bribe had been sought by officials of WBSEB to render a routine service refusing to make himself available to face the petitioner's cross-examination, the entire edifice of the charge had to fall and the inquiry officer had to drop the matter by holding that the charges had not been proved. At any rate, the petitioner contends, that since Roy Pratihar, the subordinate employee who was charged along with the petitioner, was not called as a witness by the management, whatever action or statement is attributed to Roy Pratihar could not have been looked into by the inquiry officer in course of examining the charges brought against the petitioner.
The petitioner submits that since the petitioner was discharged by the criminal court, such aspect of the matter should be taken into account afresh by the disciplinary authority or the employer and the punishment handed down to the petitioner revisited. The petitioner claims the order of acquittal to be honourable, though the petitioner accepts that there is no distinction between an honourable acquittal or acquittal otherwise recognised in statute law. The petitioner exhorts that once a criminal court, which is an extension of the sovereign, has taken a view in favour of the petitioner, a private body of adjudicators, have, per force, to conform to the views expressed by the criminal court.
9The petitioner has referred to a judgment reported at AIR 1963 SC 1914 (Sur Enamel and Stamping Works Ltd v. The Workmen) as to the safeguards in the procedure before a departmental action that should be looked into by a court in exercise of its power of judicial review. Though the matter pertained to the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947, the five aspects noted therein apply with equal force to disciplinary actions, particularly in the assessment of the procedure when the action or the penalty is challenged by way of a petition under Article 226 of the Constitution. Paragraph 4 of the report instructs that the employee proceeded against must be clearly informed of the charges against him; that witnesses should be examined in respect of the charges and, preferably, in the presence of the charged employee; that the employee ought to be given a fair opportunity to cross-examine the witnesses; that the employee is afforded the right to examine his witnesses, including himself; and, that the inquiry officer records his findings with reasons for the same in his report. On each of the five counts, as indicated in the judgment, the inquiry report herein and the procedure adopted in course of the impugned departmental action cannot be faulted. It is not the petitioner's case that he did not know the implication of the charges that were brought against him. The petitioner was permitted a chance to be present in course of the examination of the management witnesses, which the petitioner chose not to accept. Despite the petitioner's initial absence at the inquiry, he was allowed to cross-examine the management witnesses, except the complainant who refused to come, in the spirit of commendable magnanimity shown by the inquiry officer. The petitioner did not call any witness, not even Roy Pratihar, the subordinate who was also charged. The inquiry officer rendered an unimpeachable report with reasons in support of the 10 findings and by discarding the oral evidence of one of the primary witnesses.
The petitioner has also placed a judgment reported at (1991) 2 SCC 335 (Babu Lal v. State of Haryana). Paragraph 7 of the report has been relied upon. However, it does not appear that anything in such report is of any relevance in the present context. The petitioner in that case was appointed by a public body on a temporary basis. A criminal charge, unconnected with the employee's usual line of duty, was brought against the employee and, as a consequence, his temporary engagement was suspended. The criminal court acquitted the accused on the ground that the accused was not present at the place of occurrence. It was further observed that the persecution "could not point out even a single factor by which the participation of this accused can be said to have been proved ..." Notwithstanding such order, the engagement of the concerned temporary employee was discontinued which resulted in the filing of a suit and appeals being carried from the orders passed in the suit. Clearly, on facts, the present petition or the position of the present petitioner cannot be equated with that of the petitioner in the reported case.
The other judgment referred to by the petitioner is reported at (2006) 5 SCC 446 (G. M. Tank v. State of Gujarat). In that case, a departmental inquiry against the employee found that he had assets beyond his known sources of income and, on such ground, he was dismissed from service. In the criminal action on the same grounds of corruption, the criminal court found no evidence at all. In the light of the positive finding of the criminal court, the Supreme Court observed that when the charges were on the same set of facts and evidence and also pertained to the known sources of income of 11 the employee and since the criminal court had found that there was no evidence against the petitioner and the departmental punishment was founded on no evidence and mere presumption, the order of punishment was liable to be set aside. The findings rendered by the criminal court in this case do not detract from the cogent findings of the inquiry officer.
The petitioner also refers to Regulation 67 of the Service Regulations. Such regulation pertains to reinstatement and provides for the extent of back wages and back pay that a reinstated employee would be entitled to receive if the order of suspension or the order of dismissal were to be set aside and the employee reinstated in service. Clearly, from the opening words of the said regulation, it would be evident that such regulation has no manner of application in the instant case and the honourable acquittal referred to in clause (a) thereof has nothing to do with any honourable acquittal by a criminal court but it refers to the honourable acquittal by the disciplinary, appellate or revisional authority:
"67. When the suspension of any employee is held to have been unjustifiable, or not wholly justifiable, or when an employee of the Board who has been dismissed, removed or suspended is reinstated, the punishing or appellate authority may grant to him for the period of his absence from duty:
(a) If he is honourably acquitted, the full pay to which he would have been entitled if he had not been dismissed, removed or suspended and, an order to be separately recorded, any allowance of which he was in receipt prior to his dismissal, removal or suspension or, 12
(b) If otherwise, such proportion of such pay and allowance as the punishing or appellate authority may prescribe.
In a case falling under clause (a), the period of absence from duty will be treated as a period spent on duty. In a case falling under clause (b), the period may be treated as duty or leave but it will not be so treated unless the punishing or appellate authority so directs."
The petitioner seeks to suggest that the entire evidence that was before the inquiry officer must be reapprised in the extraordinary jurisdiction. Indeed, the very approach of the petitioner, in citing judgments that are scarcely apposite in the context and referring to the Service Regulations without the amendment and relying on another regulation that plainly does not apply, it is evident that the petitioner seeks to make a desperate bid that completely lacks in conviction, to discredit the process in an attempt to wriggle out of the grave charge levelled against him and found to have been established.
In his attempt to clutch at straws in the hope that one of them may stick, the petitioner has laboured over a point that is not taken in the petition to suggest that the appellate order is bad since the appellate authority was one D. Mukherjee, who was the third witness cited by the management before the inquiry officer. In course of such submission, unsupported in a petition pending for nearly two decades and fitfully urged at the very end of the rejoinder at a final hearing spanning the best part of three judicial hours, the petitioner appears to be oblivious to the fact that the appellate authority was a committee constituted under the Service Regulations and not a solitary person, though the order of the appellate authority was signed by one D. Mukherjee. Since the point was never raised in the petition, the employer was not called 13 upon to explain whether D. Mukherjee merely signed the order on behalf of the appellate authority or such D. Mukherjee was the same Dibyen Mukherjee who had been called as a witness or whether he was a part of the appellate committee. Litigants cannot be permitted to make a complete mockery of the judicial process in points of fact being raised at the Bar without any foundation in such regard in the pleadings.
It is necessary that an example be made of some matters, if only to discourage the reckless manner in which unworthy causes are carried to court which result in just causes withering and dying. In the present case, notwithstanding the complainant not coming back to be cross-examined at a later stage, the inquiry officer was good enough to disregard the oral evidence of such management witness. The inquiry officer found that despite such evidence being disregarded, the evidence of the other credible witnesses could not be wished away and the petitioner's guilt stood established thereby. That is sufficiently and succinctly expressed in the inquiry report extracted above.
It was open to the petitioner to call Roy Pratihar as a witness. The petitioner chose not to do so. Yet the petitioner wastes precious judicial time in labouring over the fact that Roy Pratihar did not come to prove that he had carried the money to the petitioner's chambers. Though the evidence is not required to be addressed in this jurisdiction, the abject mendacity of the petitioner's case is apparent from the evidence as recorded in the inquiry report. There were six officers of sufficient credibility and standing who witnessed Roy Pratihar with the marked notes entering the chambers of the petitioner, then coming out and indicating that the money had been made over to the petitioner, whereupon the entire team stormed 14 into the chambers of the petitioner and found the money from the petitioner's person and in his hip-pocket. Rather than the petitioner, in such state of the evidence, either backing down or furnishing cogent evidence to disprove the same, the petitioner seeks to digress from the material to the irrelevant by repeatedly pointing to the red herring of the original complainant not staying back to be cross-examined at the petitioner's time of convenience and of Roy Pratihar not being called upon by the management. After all, the complainant was initially available for cross-examination when the petitioner stayed away from the inquiry; and Roy Pratihar was a co-accused whom the petitioner could also have cited as a witness.
The petitioner also refers to the disciplinary authority not applying its independent mind to the matters in issue and rendering an opinion without elaborately referring to the findings in the inquiry report. Plainly, in the light of the petitioner's recalcitrance and failure to respond to the inquiry report, the disciplinary authority could have merely accepted the report and issued a one-line order of dismissal. The prima facie opinion of the disciplinary authority had already been indicated in the letter dated February 3, 1999 issued to the petitioner. Further, when a subsequent or superior authority agrees with the reasoned findings of a previous or subordinate authority in course of the same proceedings, a repetition of the reasons in support of the findings is not called for. As long as it is evident that the subsequent or superior authority had applied its mind to the matters in issue, that would suffice.
In the petitioner's previous writ petition being disposed of by only leaving the petitioner free to urge the grounds available to him 15 before the appellate authority, it is evident that the court was not satisfied that the order of punishment had been made behind the back of the petitioner or the order of punishment could be detracted from otherwise than in the usual course of the appellate remedy available to the petitioner.
The employer has referred to a recent judgment reported at (2015) 3 SCC 779 (Union of India v. Purushottam). Paragraph 14 of the report is apposite in the present context:
"14. In R. P. Kapur vs. Union of India the question before the Constitution Bench was that the petitioner therein had been suspended owing to the pendency of criminal proceedings against him which was challenged on the anvil of Article 314 of the Constitution. Thus, this decision is not of much relevance for the resolution of the legal nodus before us, save for the observations that (AIR p. 792, para 9) "if the trial of the criminal charge results in conviction, disciplinary proceedings are bound to follow against the public servant so convicted, even in case of acquittal proceedings may follow where the acquittal is other than honourable." However, on this aspect of the law we need go no further than the recent decision in Inspector General of Police vs. S. Samuthiram, since it contains a comprehensive discourse on all the prominent precedents. This Court has concluded, and we respectfully think correctly, that acquittal of an employee by a criminal court would not automatically and conclusively impact departmental proceedings.
"14.1. Firstly, this is because of the disparate degrees of proof in the two viz. beyond reasonable doubt in criminal prosecution contrasted by preponderant proof in civil or departmental enquiries.
"14.2. Secondly, criminal prosecution is not within the control of the department concerned and acquittal could be the consequence of shoddy investigation or slovenly assimilation of evidence, or lackadaisical if not collusive conduct of the trial, etc. 16 "14.3. Thirdly, an acquittal in a criminal prosecution may preclude a contrary conclusion in a departmental enquiry if the former is a positive decision in contradistinction to a passive verdict which may be predicated on technical infirmities. In other words, the criminal court must conclude that the accused is innocent and not merely conclude that he has not been proved to be guilty beyond reasonable doubt."
The order of the criminal court has been made a part of CAN 6019 of 2014. Such order of November 19, 2012 refers to the circumstances in which the charges were brought against the petitioner herein and, in dismissing such charges, the criminal court observed as follows:
"On the other hand, mere allegation was converted into a case under Section 7 of the Act (Prevention of Corruption Act) and the investigation was illegally made, may be with the idea that the alleged crime can never be punished. Be that as it may, without making any further comment on the nature of investigation required in such cases, I am convinced from the materials-on-record do not support neither the prosecution case nor the investigation was lawfully done and sanction of prosecution was not lawfully obtained of such illegality and lacunae make the entire case unworthy of credence."
If the language of the judge is pardoned and only the essence thereof gleaned from the passage, the opinion rendered does not amount to an honourable acquittal. An honourable acquittal is where the court renders an affirmative finding of the non- involvement of the accused in the commission of the alleged offence and pronounces the accused to be innocent; not when the charge is not looked into for any procedural error, as in this case.
Later in the order, the criminal court found that no proper sanction had been accorded under Section 197 of the Code for proceeding against the accused and the technical defects could 17 not be overcome by the prosecution. The court observed that the benefit of the doubt had to be given to the petitioner as the prosecution "has failed to prove its case beyond all reasonable doubt."
The quality of the order is not of the kind as in Babu Lal. The criminal court found that the investigation conducted against the petitioner was not lawful and that no sanction to prosecute the petitioner was available. Even in the judicial categorisation of "honourable acquittals", the order dated November 19, 2012 would not qualify as one. It has merely to pass as an order that acquitted the petitioner for the charges against the petitioner not being proved beyond reasonable doubt.
The petitioner has finally asserted that whenever an order of punishment is passed in departmental proceedings and in the parallel criminal proceedings the employee is acquitted of the charges, it is incumbent on the disciplinary authority or the employer to take the order in the criminal matter into account for reconsidering the punishment handed out to the employee.
Apart from the fact that there is a distinction made in such regard in judgments between an honourable acquittal and an acquittal otherwise; it cannot be lost sight of that the standards of proof in the two sets of proceedings are distinct and it is only when an order of a criminal court overtly finds in favour of the employee, in the sense that such finding would demolish the evidence on which the disciplinary authority may have founded the order of punishment, that would call for the order of punishment to be revisited. In any event, since the order of punishment as upheld in appeal is pending before the court, this 18 matter does not have to be sent back to the disciplinary authority or the employer for reconsideration.
The nature of the order of acquittal in this case is not such as would warrant the order of punishment to be questioned on such ground. The order of punishment in this case is founded on the impeccable report of the inquiry officer that has established the charges brought against the petitioner on the basis of credible, cogent evidence of high officials who had no axe to grind against the petitioner. Though the complainant may not have faced the petitioner's cross-examination and his oral evidence may have been discarded, the charge was established. As evident from the inquiry report, Roy Pratihar entered the chambers of the petitioner and shortly thereafter the money that Roy Pratihar carried to deliver to the petitioner was found in the hip-pocket of the petitioner and such facts were corroborated as such by several persons. Once the charge was established and the same was accepted by the disciplinary and appellate authorities, there was little scope for the petitioner to question the basis of the order of punishment. It appears that this petition was filed in 1999 more with a hope and a prayer for an accident than with any conviction that any reasonable authority would undo the punishment.
Since considerable court time has been wasted on a completely unworthy cause of a corrupt officer who was proved to have demanded and accepted a bribe and was caught red-handed, WP 17643 (W) of 1999 and CAN 6019 of 2014 are dismissed with costs assessed at Rs.1 lakh.
19Certified website copies of this order, if applied for, be urgently made available to the parties upon compliance with the requisite formalities.
(Sanjib Banerjee, J.)