‘Not proper in the eye of law’: Telangana HC slams improper enhancement of penalty, quashes dismissal of government employee

A division bench comprising Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice G M Mohiuddin ruled that the government’s move to enhance a previously accepted penalty was legally unsustainable. (File Photo)

The Telangana High Court has dismissed a writ appeal filed by the state government, upholding a lower court’s decision to quash the dismissal of a government employee. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice G M Mohiuddin ruled that the government’s move to enhance a previously accepted penalty was legally unsustainable.

The case involved D Ramchander, a junior stenographer at Jawahar Bal Bhavan in Hyderabad, who was in 2007 accused of submitting fake degree certificates to secure promotion as a senior assistant in 2002. In 2017, Ramchander was found partially guilty and demoted back to his original rank of junior stenographer following disciplinary proceedings. While he had accepted this penalty and was serving in the reduced post, the state government invoked Rule 40 of the Telangana Civil Services (Classification, Control and Appeal) Rules to enhance the punishment to dismissal from service in April 2023.

A writ court had quashed the dismissal order on June 14, 2024, directing Ramchander’s reinstatement with all consequential benefits. Aggrieved by this, the state government and the School Education department filed the present writ appeal.

The high court noted that Ramachander had suffered and accepted departmental punishment of demotion in scale of pay, grade, post and recovery of excess payment made on one hand, and on the other hand been already acquitted of the same charge of producing fake degree certificate and provisional certificate for obtaining promotion in a judgment dated August 2010 before the penalty was imposed in the disciplinary proceedings on September 2017.

In its judgment delivered on December 29, 2025, the Division Bench found that the authorities had erred in reopening a settled punishment. The court noted that the enhancement of the penalty was improper, particularly since the respondent had already accepted and was undergoing the initial punishment.

“We are of the opinion that the enhancement of penalty invoking Rule 40 of CCA Rules by the appellants was not proper in the eye of law,” the bench remarked. It further observed that “the findings of the learned writ court on that count do not require any interference.”

While dismissing the appeal, the high court provided a crucial clarification regarding the reinstatement. Since the original 2017 punishment, which reduced Ramchander to the post of junior stenographer, had been accepted by him, the court ruled that he should be restored to that specific level rather than his original pre-2017 position.

The court observed, “The writ petitioner would thus be entitled to be reinstated to the reduced post of Junior Stenographer pursuant to the order dated 16.09.2017. He would be entitled to the arrears of salary from the date on which he was dismissed from service… till the date of his reinstatement.”