S.D. Manohara vs Konkan Railway Corporation Limited

2024 INSC 693 IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION

CIVIL APPEAL NO. of 2024 Arising out of SLP (C) No. 15788 of 2021

S.D. MANOHARA ...APPELLANT(S)

VERSUS

KONKAN RAILWAY CORPORATION LIMITED & ORS. …RESPONDENT(S)

JUDGMENT

PAMIDIGHANTAM SRI NARASIMHA, J.

1. Leave granted.

2. The adjudication in this case is intended to resolve a long

standing service dispute between the parties, rather than to lay

down any precedent of law.

3. The short facts necessary for resolution of this dispute revolve

around the invariable question that arises in disputes involving

withdrawal of the resignation letter1, i.e. whether the employee

Signature Not Verified

Resignation can be withdrawn before its acceptance, is an established principle of law; Suman v. Digitally signed by 1 Marwah Indu Date: 2024.09.13

Jain v. Marwadi Sammelan, 2024 SCC OnLine SC 161; Air India Express Limited v. Captain 17:12:03 IST Reason:

Gurdarshan Kaur Sandhu, (2019) 17 SCC 129; Srikantha S.M. v. Bharath Earth Movers Limited, (2005) 8 SCC 314; Balram Gupta v. Union of India, 1987 Supp SCC 228; Union of India v. Gopal Chandra Misra (1978) 2 SCC 301.

1 has withdrawn his resignation before its acceptance by the

employer or not. Having examined the matter in detail, we have

arrived at the conclusion that resignation was in fact

withdrawn before its acceptance. We have thus allowed the

appeal and directed reinstatement of the appellant. Further,

to balance equities, we ordered the salary payable for the period

that the appellant has not worked to be restricted to 50% of the

salary payable for the said period.

4. The appellant has been in service of the respondent since 1990.

After having put in 13 years of service, he tendered his

resignation on 05.12.2013 stating that it may be considered as

coming into effect on expiry of one month. On the question

whether this resignation letter was withdrawn before its

acceptance, there are a number of letters and instances cited

by the appellant and the respondent as well, but the crucial

letters that would clinch the issue are just four in number.

5. The respondent states that the letter of resignation was

accepted on 15.04.2014 w.e.f from 07.04.2014. Respondent

further states that the appellant sought to withdraw his

resignation dated 05.12.2013 only on 26.05.2014, which could

not be accepted and therefore, they have rejected the request

on 23.06.2014 and relieved the appellant w.e.f. 01.07.2014.

2 5.1 On the other hand, the appellant’s primary submission was

that the letter dated 15.04.2014 was never issued to him. It

was only an internal communication of the respondent. He

further submits that the said communication dated

15.04.2014 was not even marked to the appellant and it has

no reference to appellant’s resignation letter dated 05.12.2013.

That, it is an internal communication is also evidenced by the

fact that it does not fix any date for relieving, instead it directed

necessary action like no dues certificate etc. to be given to the

appellant before relieving him. Importantly, the appellant

fortifies his case by stating that he continued in service despite

the initial letter dated 05.12.2013 and had in fact reported on

19.05.2014. He relied on letter dated 10.05.2014 issued by the

respondent directing him to report to duty pursuant to his

application dated 24.04.2014 for casual leave for two days i.e.

for 25th and 26th of April 2014. He also relied on letters of his

wife dated 17.04.2014 and 20.05.2014 requesting the

respondent not to accept her husband’s resignation. A

certificate of competency issued by the respondent stating that

the appellant is competent to take the Engineering Block is also

relied on by the respondent employer.

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6. Questioning the letter dated 23.06.2014, formally rejecting his

withdrawal, the appellant filed a Writ Petition No. 50662/2014

(S-RES) before the High Court of Karnataka at Bengaluru. The

learned Single Judge by its judgment dated 16.07.2019 allowed

the Writ Petition and directed reinstatement of the appellant

with all benefits. Challenging the said order of the Single Judge,

the respondent filed a Writ Appeal No. 3982 of 2019 (S-RES)

before the High Court of Karnataka at Bengaluru which was

allowed by the Division Bench by the order impugned before

us.

7. The analysis and decision of the Division Bench is confined to

just two paragraphs in the otherwise long judgment.

Paragraphs 5 and 21 of the judgment are as under:-

“5….

Here in the instant case, the resignation was not immediately accepted as sought for by the petitioner on expiry of one month. The resignation which was submitted on 05.12.2013 was accepted with effect from 07.04.2014. This was communicated to the petitioner on 15.04.2014 with a relieving date. The letter to withdraw the resignation was made on 26.05.2014. The petitioner was communicated rejection of his request to withdraw the resignation only on 23.06.2014. The petitioner was relieved on the basis of the said communication on 01.07.2014 and official order was issued on 15.07.2014…. In the present case, the resignation was not accepted as sought for by the petitioner at the expiry of one month from 05.12.2013 and he was allowed to work till he was relieved only on 01.07.2014 with office order issued on 15.07.2014…”

4 7.1 Again in the concluding paragraph no. 21, the Division Bench

of the High Court held as under:-

“21. In the light of the above discussion, this Court is of the opinion that the employer was justified in rejecting the request made by the respondent- employee in respect of withdrawal of resignation as his resignation dated 05.12.2013 was accepted with effect from 07.04.2014 and the application for withdrawal was submitted on 26.05.2014, i.e. after expiry of the period on which the resignation came into force.”

8. Questioning the correctness of the decision of the High Court

the appellant filed the present appeal, and this Court issued

notice on 29.10.2021. We heard Mr. Basavaprabhu S. Patil,

Senior Advocate assisted by Mr. Anirudh Sanganeria, AOR and

Mr. Samarth Kashyap, Advocate on behalf of the appellant. We

also heard Mr. Atul Yeshwant Chitale, Senior Advocate assisted

by Mr. Madhav Atul Chitale, Mr. Nirbhay Singh, Advocates,

Mrs. Suchitra Atul Chitale, AOR and Mr. Sauryapratapsinh

Barhat, Advocate on behalf of the respondents.

9. At the outset, we may record that, even assuming that the

appellant withdrew resignation letter dated 05.12.2013 on

26.05.2014, it is just about five months in a long service of 24

years in the Indian Railways. Between these two admitted

dates, lie the competing and highly contested claims of parties

that the resignation is either withdrawn or not withdrawn

5 before its acceptance. Our enquiry is confined to finding this

fact.

10. The respondent-employer strongly relies on the letter of

acceptance of resignation dated 15.04.2014 and submits that

it has come into effect from 07.04.2014. We are inclined to

accept the submission made by the appellant that the letter

dated 15.04.2014 is an internal communication. There is no

clear evidence about the service of such letter on the appellant.

Further, it is also not denied that the appellant has been

continuously in touch with the respondent. There is no reason

as to why the respondent-Corporation would write a letter on

10.05.2014 requesting the appellant to report to duty for

considering his unauthorised absence from 28.04.2014 to

18.05.2014.

11. It is an admitted fact that the appellant has in fact reported to

duty on 19.05.2014. There is also the communication of the

appellants wife on 17.04.2014 and 20.05.2014 requesting that

the resignation dated 05.12.2013 should not be accepted by

the respondents. As stated earlier, there is also the letter dated

10.05.2014 of the respondent asking the appellant to report on

duty for considering his unauthorised absence from

28.04.2014 to 18.05.2014 which gives an indication that there

6 was no finality to the letter of resignation dated 05.12.2013.

The learned single Judge was correct in his conclusion that the

resignation was withdrawn before its acceptance. The relevant

portion of the single Judge order is as under:-

“13. In the present case, the resignation which was submitted on 05.12.2013 with a request to accept it at the expiry of one month was stated to have been accepted only on 15.04.2014. There is undue delay in accepting the resignation by the respondents. In the above decision, the delay of mere 13 days in communicating acceptance of the resignation, is held to be not an undue delay so as to infer that resignation had not already been accepted. Therefore, the decision in Vedpathi Dinesh Kumar’s case is also of no help to the respondents.

14. In the circumstances, I am of the view that petitioner having submitted his letter dated 26.5.2014 seeking to withdraw the resignation much before the effective date, 01.07.2014 with official order on 15.07.2014 by which the petitioner was relieved of his duties, withdrawal of resignation ought to have been accepted by the respondents and continued the petitioner in service. The contrary decision by the respondents by the communication dated 23.06.2014 that withdrawal of resignation is not accepted and decision accepting the resignation stands good, is not sustainable in law….”

12. In our opinion, the decision of the Single Judge is correct, and

the Division Bench committed an error in not eschewing the

communication dated 15.04.2014 from consideration.

13. In view of the above, and in the facts and the circumstances of

the case, we allow the appeal and set-aside the judgment of the

Division Bench of the High Court of Karnataka in Bengaluru in

Writ Appeal No. 3982 of 2019 (S-RES).

7 13.1 In the facts and circumstances of the case, we direct that the

appellant shall be reinstated into service within thirty days

from the date of our order. He shall however be entitled to

receive 50 percent of salary for the period he is said to have

been relieved from service i.e. from 01.07.2014 under letter

dated 23.06.2014 to the date of reinstatement, pursuant to our

orders. The amount shall be calculated and paid within a

period of two months from today. This period shall however be

counted for pensionary benefits, if any.

13.2 Parties shall bear their own costs.

………………………………....J. [PAMIDIGHANTAM SRI NARASIMHA]

………………………………....J. [PANKAJ MITHAL]

NEW DELHI;

September 13, 2024.

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