A copy of the Law Department's opinion on the above subject is forwarded to all Departments of Secretariat for information and guidance. Copy of Extract of Law Department's opinion taken from the file bearing C. No.3286/63-Ser.C. of General Administration (Ser.C) Department.
Sub:- Public Services - Civil
Services (CC&A) Rules - Procedure to be followed in cases of minor
penalties - Regarding.
The scope of the expression "any of the penalties" occurring in rule 12 and 14 of the Andhra C.C.A. Rules and in rules 14 and 15 of the Hyderabad C.C.A. Rules, cannot be cut down by understanding the same to mean as any one of the penalties. When a particular expression is used in a statute or statutory rule, it has to be presumed that the Legislature or the rule making authority, as the case may be has used that expression in the sense in which it has been understood or interpreted by courts of Law, unless a contrary intention appears from that statute or statutory rule. "The word 'any' may have one of several meanings; according to the circumstances, may mean 'all'; 'each’; 'every'; 'some' or one or more out of several" - vide the Law Lexicon by Ramanatha Iyer. If the rule makers had intended that for any single lapse of which a Government servant has been found guilty in any disciplinary proceeding, only one, but not more than one, of the several penalties specified in the C.C.A. Rules should be imposed upon that Government servant, that intention should have been brought out clearly in the relevant C. C.A. Rules. There is nothing in the Andhra C.C.A. Rules or the Hyderabad C.C.A. Rules from which such an intention can be gathered by implication, either.
It may, however, be pointed out that imposition of several penalties indiscriminately for a single lapse on the part of a government servant could not have been contemplated by the rule making authority. The imposition of multifarious effect of those penalties is for out of proportion to the gravity of the dereliction. The imposition of a single major penalty may be more severe in its effect than the imposition of two or more minor penalties. In a case where a severe penalty is called for, it is open to the punishing authority to impose two or more less severe penalties instead of the severe penalty, taking a lenient view of the magnitude of the delinquency. In a case where the delinquency on the part of a government servant consists in, say misappropriation of Government funds the penalty of recovery from the pay of that Government servant of the loss caused to the Government may merely compensate the Government for the loss sustained by it, but that by itself may not be a sufficient punishment for the delinquency.
In such a case, the punishing authority, while ordering recovery of the loss caused to the Government from the pay of the delinquent officer, may impose upon him some other penalty while the former may be intended to compensate the Government the latter may, may be intended to make the delinquent suffer the consequences of his misdemeanour.
As the rules stands at present, there does not seem to be any objection to the imposition of some penalty, in addition to the recovery from pay of the loss caused to the Government upon a Government servant who is found in disciplinary proceedings to have caused loss to the Government as a result of his negligence or misconduct.
OPEN - CCA Rules - References (open)
