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1. On 04.11.2007, a sting operation was televised on the news channel „India TV‟, wherein a jawan in uniform was shown receiving bribe. It was alleged that the jawan was a member of the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) and that he was taking bribe from a civilian to permit entry into the precincts of the Indian Oil Corporation Refinery at Panipat.

2. It was highlighted in the Sting Operation that the Government of India spends crores of rupees of tax-payers‟ money to raise a Force charged with the duty to protect important and vital installations belonging to the Government and Public Sector Undertakings and that rather than protect these installations, members of the force were making illegal gains by permitting all and sundry to freely enter the Public Sector Undertakings. It was sought to be highlighted that security of public installations in which millions of rupees were invested by the Government were under threat of terrorists and how easy was it for anybody to breach the security.

3. Indeed, the Sting Operation had shown a dirty underbelly of the security at the refinery in question and was rightly viewed with the seriousness it deserved by the senior officers of CISF who immediately contacted the news channel and obtained a copy thereof for viewing with the intention of identifying who was the jawan receiving bribe to permit illegal entry into the refinery and Assistant Commandant of the CISF Unit in charge of the refinery identified the jawan to be the petitioner.

4. Insp.Ranbir Singh was deputed by the Group Commandant to conduct a preliminary inquiry and he gave a preliminary report indicating that there was sufficient material to initiate disciplinary proceedings against the petitioner, and considering the same the Competent Authority served a charge memorandum dated 12.11.2007 upon the petitioner, listing one article of charge as under:-

15. Sh.Kulwant Sharma PW-6 deposed that he had conducted the sting operation on 05.05.2006 and that the petitioner had asked him for `150/- as bribe to be allowed to enter inside NFL and IOC Refinery at Panipat which he statedly had paid as shown in the video. That he had first tried to sell the video to Star News Channel but since they did not telecast the video for a long time, he sold the video to India T.V. which is why the telecast of the sting operation got delayed. He also admitted that he was not a reporter with India T.V.. In his cross- examination he stated that the sting operation was shot from a distance with a camera kept in a car with tinted glasses, thus the conversation could not be recorded. That since the telecast was delayed, the time and date of the video was not shown in the clipping. He further stated that he had informed the PRO, IOC Sh.Noorana that the IOC Refinery was not safe and that he was assured by the PRO that the Assistant Commandant is informed and appropriate actions will be taken after an inquiry.

17. During arguments the following submissions were urged:-

(i) That the fresh preliminary inquiry directed to be conducted vide letter dated 27.12.2007 was conducted by the same officer who had conducted the initial preliminary inquiry and thus there would be bias in the mind of the officer concerned, who would be inclined to uphold his preliminary findings.

(ii) That the entire case against the petitioner is based on a sting operation recorded on a CD and telecasted by a news channel. It was urged that nothing was brought on record to prove the authenticity of the video recording; neither was the original CD containing the original recording of the sting operation produced nor was the person recording the same examined.