S. ABDUL JABBAR KHAN (CHAIRMAN). -Ejaz Muhammad Khan, Deputy Secretary, Kashmir Affairs and Northern Affairs Division Islamabad, has filed this appeal under section 4 of the Punjab Service Tribunal Act, 1974, in which he has impleaded Province of the Punjab through Chief Secretary, Government of the Punjab, as respondent. By virtue of this appeal he has prayed that the adverse entries communicated to him through letter dated 24th January 1981 as well as the order dated 25/27th July, 1981 received by the appellant on 30th July, 1981 be set aside.
2. Brief facts of the case are that the appellant was posted from 1-1-1978 to 5-8-1979 as Administrator, Municipal Corporation, Rawalpindi. The Reporting Officer i.e. Commissioners, Rawalpindi Division, gave an adverse entry for the period 1-1-1979 to 5-8-1979 to be placed on record of the appellant. These remarks were countersigned by the first countersigning authority with his own. Observations which were also adverse in nature He filed a. Representation to the Chief ,SecretaryGovernment of the Punjab on 19-2-1981 which was rejected. Hencethis appeal.
3. The learned counsel for the appellanthas submitted that the confidential report conveyed the appellant patently suffers from con--tradictions and infirmities. It has been further argued that the adverse remarks have been on intentional complaints and were vague in nature.It was further pointed out that the fact of the adverse remarks which declared the appellant unfit for retention in service after 25 years were based on surmises and conjectures and did not have specific instance of corruption and efficiency. It was vehemently argued by the learned counsel that in fact all this confusion arose on account of sanctioning of a building plan on Parsi graveyard, which according to the learned counsel was in fact the correct decision fully supported by the judgment of the Civil Judge, Additional District Judge and of the High Court and based on the advice of the legal adviser of the Corporation. On the other hand the learned District Attorney has submitted that Reporting Officeras well as first countersigning officer have, fully substantiated their assessment while commenting on" the representation of the appellant. Therefore, no excep--tion would betaken to their well-considered' opinion which was subjective in nature.
4. We have givenhour anxious thoughts to the arguments advanced by the learned counsel for the parties and would analyse the entire case keeping into"cansideration the acts as found it from the record of the Corporation and other relevant recordof the Department.It would be useful to reproducethe adverse entries indispute;----- Integrity (a)-Intellectual"Below average"
Fitness for retention after 25 years Unfit service.
Penpicture.-"However, his controlover municipal affairs left much to be desired, as there was a spate of complaints regardinghis inefficiency and corruption from the people and the staff during his tenure. His integrity was openly questioned in thecase of giving permission to construct commercial building on Parsi Graveyard in disregard of the conditions imposed by the high powered Committee and entry in revenue record.
The following remarks were also given by the Secretary to Govt. ---Labour Department as firstcountersigning officer. Whichare reproduced as under :----- Was found to be a poor Administrator of RawalpindiMunicipalCorporation and his performance was far from satisfactory." - 5.We have carefully perused the character roll of the appellant in order to see what was his performance in the past. In this respect sue find that he joined service in 1954 as lawyer Magistrate and his first report was given by AhmadKhan Tareen, P. C. S. Who was his District Magistrate; at Lyallpur. In this report his per--formance was considered good all round. Similarly; S.M. Shafi-ul- Islam, C.S.P District Magistrate, Lyalipur Masud -Ahmad, Addl. Distt : Magistrate, Lyallpur Abdus Sattar, Addl. Distt. Magistrate Rawalpindi, G. Yazdani Malik, D C Rawalpindi, Ahmad Raza Khan, D. C.
Lahore, Allauddin Ahmad, D. C. Rawalpindi, M. R. Inayat D. C. Rawalpindi, Niaz Ahmad, Commissioner Rawalpindi, M. H. Shah, Commissioner Rawalpindi Division, Muhammad Ashraf, D. C. Rawalpindi, Capt. Jamshed Burki, C. S. P., D. C., Sargodha, Muhammad Mohsin, formerly Commissioner, Sargodha, Safdar Hussain, Commissioner Sargodha, F. K. Bendial, Commissioner Rawalpindi, now Federal Secretary, Syed Naseer Ahmad, Commissioner Rawalpindi, Manzoor Ahmad Leghari, Commissioner Rawalpindi, also gave good reports to the appellant and rated him as efficient and a man of integrity. Thus the appellant was considered competent officer with a clean record of service right uptil 1978. It is also interesting to note that F. I. Malik, who has given him the present adverse remarks, considered his work from 17-8-77 to 31-12-1977 as satisfactory and 1-1-1978 to 17- 7-1978 as good and found him wanting of qualities of honesty, integrity and efficiency during the period 1-1-79 to 5-8-79. It would also be useful to mention that the officer has earned two more good reports for the period 6-2-80 to 13-9-80 and 1-1-81 to 25-10-81 from Mr. Manzur Ahmad Leghari, Commissioner, Rawalpindi Division, and H. M. Chohan, Additional Secretary, Kashmir Affairs and Northern Affairs Division, Islamabad.
6. In view of above detailed analyses of the working of the appellant before and after the despatch of adverse entries one has to go into the root causes of the said report and to assess the argument advanced by the learned counsel for the appellant in support of his contentions.
7. To our assessm ent in regard to these adverse entries the root cause seems to be the sanctioning of the plan of commercial building on the Parsi Graveyard by the appellant. This fact is clearly mentioned in the pen-picture drawn by the reporting officer as well as in his comments which were submitted by him on his report to the Chief Secretary as well as from the record of the Corporation, which was summoned by this Tribunal and perused by it, it is apparent that this plan was duly considered by the high-powered committee of which Commissioner was the Chairman. The record of the minutes reveal that the said Committee duly permitted sanction of the site plan at the request of the Parsi community, which was subject to one condition only that it should be verified whether the land on which construction was being made was a vacant site or a graveyard. The appellant verified this fact and was satisfied from the report that the building was going to be constructed on a vacant site, which was not being used as a graveyard and that too for the benefit of the said Parsi Community. However, he was vigilant enough to refer this matter to the legal adviser of the Corporation, who was an eminent lawyer, namely, Maulvi Sirajul Haq The said Maulvi Sahib gave clearance by holding that the sanction would be in order as the said construction would not be on a graveyard as described in the revenue record. On this premises the appellant accorded sanction. The learned Commissioner took exception to this sanction and directed the appellant to withdraw the permission so granted by him and de-sanction the plan. The appellant complied with the directions immediately. The Parsi Community took this matter to the civil Court and were successful in securing stay order against the order of the appellant. The appellant pursued this matter In appeal before the Additional District Judge, who agreed with the Civil Judge and maintained his order. The matter did not rest there and appellant took this "lis" to the level of High Court and Mr. Justice Muhammad Ilyas in his detailed judgment, which is on the record, found that the first sanction of the appellant was prima facie in order and the plan could not be de- sanctioned. He also further held that the land in question did not form part of the public graveyard as defined in section 112 of the Punjab Local Government Act.
8. In view of the above, it could not be said that the act of the appellant was due to some ulterior motives or was otherwise illegal. Despite the fact that appellant had acted with prudence and his sanction was quite in order, with regard to this graveyard matter, yet as this matter, got publicity in the Press and controversy took the Govt. To the Courts of law, therefore, the Commissioner took exception of the same and became unhappy with the appellant. It would be appropriate to mention at this stage that the assessment or one's subordinate work and conduct if not always' can be emotional at certain occasion. It is easy to bathe in the deep sea he but very difficult rather well nigh impossible to know what would be in the, mind of other at a particular juncture. Many a time a person may feel virtuously indignant over a matter, but if the same is analysed dispassionately, it may amount to much ado about nothing, We will not be far from truth, if we hold that root cause of this sudden change of mind of the Commissioner about the conduct of the appellant, was affair of Parsi Graveyard and nothing else.
9. In view of above, we can safely infer that the appellant who was being rated as a good officer by the said reporting officer/authority in the first part of the year but fell from his good books only because of the events so discussed by us as above.
10. With regard to the observation of the reporting officer that there were spate of complaints against the appellant we cannot agree with the same as the said authority- did not initiate any action or administer any warning to the appellant about the said complaints which would have been a normal course for any officer who was flushed with such complaints. The record of this case clearly proves that the Commissioner, Rawalpindi Division, Mr. F. I. Malik did not call upon at any time the appellant to explain his conduct vis-a-vis such complaints as was stated by him The presumption in this case would be that these complaints must have been verbal because the same are not available on record. It is clearly laid down in the instructions with regard to writing of annual confidential reports issued by the S & G A D that the reporting authority must not give vague and general remarks on one's integrity and the same must be substantiated by examples when called upon to do so. These instructions are only meant to deter the reporting authorities in acting on their whims and fancies while assessing their integrity and efficiency. Therefore, their Lordships of the Supreme Court in case of Province of the Punjab v. Ahmed Kamaluddin have observed that the adverse entries always weigh very heavily at the time of promotion of civil servants, therefore, the Service Tribunal was within its competence to make its own assessment of the weight and importance of such like reports.
11. Similarly, we cannot accept at its face- value the observation of the reporting officer as well as of the countersigning authority that the appellant was inefficient civil servant and not upto the mark in discharge of the duties on the ground that this very officer who has stood the test of score of senior officers of this Government for his performance of duties during the long tenure of more than 24 years of service under them and was also recipient of a good report by reporting officer himself, would suddenly become inefficient and man of doubtful integrity over night. Inefficient and corruption are tracts of character which linger on with a person and D cannot be developed suddenly then can leave him abruptly. It is also a matter of consideration that when this officer started working under Mr. Manzur Ahmad Leghari, who succeeded Mr. F. I. Malik, Commissioner, Rawalpindi Division, he was found trustworthy, efficient, and a person of integrity. We also cannot remain oblivious of the fact that when this officer was transferred to a different department under the Central Government, the Additional Secretary of the said Department Mr. Chohan found him a man dedicated to his work and possessing good understanding for his field duties. This officer also rated the integrity of the officer as good and also found him fit for retention in service after completion of 25 years of service.
12. Keeping in view the entire good service record of the appellant of the past as well as his subsequent performance from the date of his disputed adverse entries and also taking into consideration that Mr. F. I. Malik in the remarks of the preceding period has found this appellant as a good officer. We are of the considered opinion that the disputed adverse entries are result of the misunderstanding which unfortunately arose over the dispute of the affairs of Parsi Graveyard and nothing else.
13. In view of the above analysis, we hereby accept the appeal, set, aside the impugned order and direct that the entries of this period recorded by Mr. F. I. Malik and Secretary, Labour be expunged.
However, the parties shall bear their own costs.