'Disciplinary action cannot be taken against a retired employee'; Supreme Court's big decision

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court made an important decision related to retired employees. The court says that if an employee retires after attaining the age of retirement or after an extended period of service, then no disciplinary action can be initiated against him. Further, the court also dismissed the petition of the State Bank of India against the decision of the Jharkhand High Court in which the dismissal order issued against Naveen Kumar Sinha was quashed.

A bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuiyan said that departmental proceedings do not start only on the issuance of a show cause notice but only when a charge sheet is issued, as this is the date for considering the allegations leveled against the employee by the competent authority. In the said case, the High Court had said that the disciplinary proceedings were initiated after his retirement, which also included the extended period of service.

Employee Naveen Kumar had been accused of sanctioning loans in favor of his relatives in violation of banking norms. While the Supreme Court also said that the respondent employee had actually retired from SBI on December 26, 2003 on completion of 30 years of service, but his service was extended on August 5, 2003 from December 27, 2003 to October 1, 2010. But no further extension in service was done after October 1, 2010.