HC quashes bank staffer’s forced retirement after acquittal in graft

Bhopal/Jabalpur: The MP high court has set aside the compulsory retirement of a Rural Development Bank field officer, ruling that departmental enquiry against him was unwarranted as he had already been acquitted of the same charges in a criminal court.The petitioner, Niranjan Singh Kaurav, said he was posted as a field officer of the bank at Bareilly in Raisen district. The Special Police Establishment (SPE) Lokayukta sleuths raided the bank following a complaint that he and the bank manager demanded Rs 5,000 as a bribe for the renewal of a Kisan Credit Card. The SPE Lokayukta registered a case of corruption against him. At the same time, the bank management initiated a DE against him.In the case presented before the civil court, he was acquitted by the judge, but the bank management in the same case decided to give him premature retirement from service. He replied to the charge-sheet during the DE, and there were witnesses from his side, but they were never examined.The court of justice Sanjay Dwivedi said the criminal case in court and the DE were based on the same charges, and when the officer was acquitted by the court, he should not have been implicated in the DE and punished. With this, the court revoked the order of his premature retirement and further directed that he be paid half of his wages for the period when he was out of a job due to the punishment of compulsory retirement meted out to him.