DECISION ' This appeal is directed against the order of learned Presiding Officer, Labour Court No, V at Karachi, dated 21-2-1988, whereby he dismissed the grievance petition of the appellant.
2. The facts leading to this appeal are that the appellant was employed as messenger by the respondent Bank. On 10-2-1986 at about 3-30 p.m. He is alleged to have given knife blows to another messenger Lal Shah in the Bank's premises. The appellant and one Taj Ali, who is also employee of the respondent were charge-sheeted for the aforesaid misconduct and after due inquiry Taj Ali was awarded minor punishment but the appellant was dismissed from service. The appellant after serving grievance notice upon the respondent filed grievance petition. The respondent resisted the grievance petition on the ground that the action of the appellant in stabbing with knife another employee of the respondents in Bank's premises during working hours was a misconduct and that he was dismissed from service after due legal inquiry.
3. I have heard Mr. Ch. Rashid Ahmed, counsel for the appellant and Mr. d Abdul Ghani, representative for the respondents and also gone through record and proceedings of the case.
4. As far as the incident is concerned that does not appear to be much disputed. The appellant had admitted to have caused knife blows to the said Lal Shah but alleged to have acted in self- defence. However, the evidence before the Enquiry Officer consisting of statements of injured Lal Shah, Naseer and Manzur Imam clearly shows that the appellant had deliberately caused injuries to Lal Shah. Even his defence witness Younus admitted before the Enquiry Officer, that he saw appellant running after Lal Shah followed by Taj Ali and that it looked that the appellant was giving knife blows to Lal Shah. In view of this evidence on record the finding of the Enquiry Officer and learned Labour Court that the aforesaid misconduct was proved against the appellant appears to be correct.
5. The learned Presiding Officer has also held that no grievance notice was served upon the respondent as the Photostat copy of the grievance notice produced by the respondent before the Labour Court was not signed by the appellant. No evidence has been produced to show that this Photostat copy Exh.3/B was the original notice received by the respondents and even it is not put to the respondent in direct question that the notice that he sent was not signed by him. He was only shown Photostat copy and he admitted that it was Photostat copy of the notice that he sent. The learned counsel for the appellant explained, that along with the copy of grievance application they had also supplied a photostat copy of the grievance notice to the respondents which was unsigned which appears to have been produced by the respondents. Be that as it may the evidence on record does not conclusively prove that the grievance notice which the appellant sent to the respondents was signed by him.
6. The learned counsel for the appellant has made two-fold submissions with regard to the legality of the enquiry. Firstly, he submitted that the dismissal order is not issued by the competent authority. The dismissal order is issued by the Secretary Disciplinary Committee. It has also come on record that this Secretary Mr. Muhammad Khan is Executive Vice-President of the Bank. The witness of respondents has produced one Circular notifying competent authorities to award punishment. This Circular is Exh. R/20, which is also relied upon by the appellant. According to the counsel for the appellant only Head of Zonal Office, shown at Sr. No, 4, was the competent authority to take action. The competent authority at Sr. No, 1 is 'Disciplinary Action Committee' Central Office, Karachi which has full power upto S.V.P. This authority appears to be senior most authority in the hierarchy of the respondent establishment and from notification it appears to have all powers to award any punishment to all officers up to S.V.P. The appellant is an employee below the S.V.P. And, therefore, this authority is competent to award the punishment though the authority shown at Sr.
No, 4 was also equally competent. The fact that punishment was awarded by the senior most authority would not render the order illegal. This objection of the appellant is not tenable.
7. Next objection of the appellant is that Enquiry Officer was himself witness of the incident and, therefore, he was not competent to hold the enquiry. In his support he relied upon the statement of one prosecution witness Manzur Imam lbefore the Enquiry Officer to the effect that after the incident he went to Mr. Khalid Farooqi, who is the Enquiry Officer and told him of the incident and took him to the place of incident where he found Lal Shah injured and he informed Mr. Muhammad Khan Memon on telephone. This statement, on the face of it, does not show that the Enquiry Officer was witness to the incident. Mr. Khalid Farooqi was examined before the learned Labour Court. In the cross-examination he has denied the suggestion that he had witnessed the incident. Mr. Ch. Rashid Ahmed has relied upon cases reported in 1978 PLC 247, 1980 PLC 137, 1981 PLC 494 and 1980 PLC 925. The facts of all these cases are distinguishable from the facts of the instant case.
Unlike the Enquiry Officer in the reported cases the Enquiry Officer in the instant case is neither witness to incident nor has he been examined as witness before any other Enquiry Committee.
8. Mr. Farooq Abdul Ghani has relied upon 1981 PLC 670, wherein this Tribunal has held 'that a person was not disqualified from being appointed as Enquiry Officer merely because in the course of his official duties a report of the incident was made to him or was brought to his notice.' In PLD 1982 Karachi 537 a Division Bench of the Sind High Court at Karachi held that 'mere fact that the Enquiry Officer had issued the first show-cause notice against the workman would not itself be sufficient in law to disqualify him from acting as Enquiry Officer in the absence of any evidence or indication from the enquiry record or otherwise that he was prejudiced or biased or had a predetermined mind.' In the instant case the appellant himself has admitted in the cross- examination that he had not made in writing any complaint against the Enquiry Officer but allegedly made oral protest before the Enquiry Officer. The learned counsel for the appellant was not able to point out from the record any act of prejudice or biase by the Enquiry Officer. The mere fact that he was informed of the incident and that he saw Lal Shah lying injured and that he informed Mr. Muhammad Khan Memon would not disqualify him from being appointed as Enquiry Officer.
9. It is further submitted by Mr. Farooq Abdul Ghani that the appellant had neither in his grievance notice nor grievance application raised any objection as to the competency of the authority who passed the dismissal order nor did he allege that the Enquiry Officer was eye-witness of the incident and as such he cannot raise this point at the time of appeal. In support he has relied upon 1978 SC MR 804, wherein it is held by their Lordships that 'where facts were neither raised in pleadings nor incorporated in issues framed no evidence can be allowed on such fact.
10. No other legal objections were raised by the learned counsel for the appellant. The two legal objections raised by him have no force and are rejected in view of the above discussion. I have already held that the evidence recorded clearly proves the alleged misconduct by the appellant.
An act of causing knife injuries to another employee by a bank employee, in the premises of the bank during office hours cannot but be considered as an act of grave nature subversive of discipline for which the only proper punishment is dismissal from service.
11. Reference may be made to the case of Akhtar Alam v. Sind Labour Appellate Tribunal 1985 PLC 570 wherein Division Bench of Sind High Court at Karachi held that in order to attract clause (h) of Standing Order 15(3) what is required is that riotous or disorderly behavior should be committed during working hours at establishment'.
12. For the reasons discussed above I find no merit in this appeal which is dismissed.