ORDER
1. The petitioner is a permanent employee of Spices Trading Corporation Limited (hereinafter referred to as the Corporation'). Due to personal reasons the petitioner tendered his resignation for the post ofMarketing Manager by his letter dated 17-6-1991 which reads as follows:
'I wish to inform you by giving 3 months advance notice that I am resigning for the post of Marketing Manager for personal reasons. I request you to adjust the E.L. in my account towards the notice period and relieve me of my duties. I thank you and the organisation for having given me excellent co-operation during my tenure'.
2. The Corporation by its letter dated 18-6-1991 (Annexure-B) accepted the resignation and requested the petitioner to handover the charge to the Chief Marketing Manager of the Corporation which reads as follows:
'with reference to the above, the Corporation accepts your resignation and you are relieved of your duties with effect from 16-9-1991 as requested by you.
You are requested to handover charge to the Chief Marketing Manager of the Corporation immediately.
You are also advised to settle all your dues to the Corporation immediately'.
(emphasis supplied)
3. Thereafter, the petitioner withdrew the resignation submitted earlier by his letter dated 10-9-1991 (Annexure-C) which reads as follows:
'With reference to the above, I write to state that by my letter dated 17-6-1991, I had tendered resignation giving 3 months notice on the grounds of personal reasons. My letter of resignation has already been accepted with effect from 16-9-1991, the date on which I have sought to be relieved, by your letter No. STCL:PERS:291:394, dated 18-6-1991.
I submit that since I have already overcome all my personal problems and that I have no personal problems.
In the circumstances, I hereby withdraw the letter of resignation which I had already given to you on 17th June, 1991. I request you to kindly accept this letter of withdrawal of my resignation and permit me to continue in the post I am working'.
4. The request of the petitioner for withdrawal of resignation was rejected by the Corporation by its memo dated 3-9-1991 which reads as follows:
'With reference to the above, you are hereby informed that your voluntary resignation as per reference under (1) above has already been accepted and the acceptance of your resignation has been communicated to you on June 18, 1991 and also you are relieved of your duties with effect from September 16, 1991 as requested by you and it is conclusive. The Corporation has also made alternative arrangements and the Corporation cannot accept your request at the fag end of the notice period.
Revoking the acceptance of any resignation will create a bad precedent affecting the working and morale of the employees of the Corporation.
In view of the above, the Corporation does not accede to your request regarding withdrawal of your resignation and the decision of the Corporation as per our letter under reference (2) stands and you are relieved of your duties in the Corporation on the close of the office hours on September 16, 1991 as already intimated to you. You are requested to settle all your dues to the Corporation immediately'.
(emphasis supplied)
5. This rejection has made the petitioner to come before this Court seeking for quashing of the Memo dated 13-9-1991 and for a direction to the Corporation to accept the letter of withdrawal of resignation and for other consequential reliefs.
6. The respondent-Corporation in its statement of objections justified its action. The short point that arises for consideration in this case is:
'Whether the respondent is justified in rejecting the request of the petitioner to withdraw the letter of resignation submitted by him earlier?'
7. Sri S.M. Babu, learned Counsel for the petitioner submitted that the petitioner in his letter dated 17-6-1991 gave three months advance notice of proposed resignation and therefore the resignation becomes effective on the expiry of three months from the date of the letter. It is further submitted that the statement made in the statement of objections that the resignation of the petitioner was accepted on 18-6-1991 itself is not correct. He nextly contended that the acceptance of resignation by the Corporation in its letter dated 18-6-1991 is with effect from 16-9-1991 and therefore the petitioner is entitled to withdraw the resignation before it becomes effective.
8. In reply, the learned Counsel for the respondent has submitted that the Corporation in its letter dated 18-6-1991 has accepted the resignation and relieved him of his duties with effect from 16-9-1991 and therefore the petitioner has no right to withdraw the resignation after its acceptance.
9. The learned Counsel for the petitioner relied on the decisions in the case of Punjab National Bank v P.K. Mittal and Balram Gupta v Union of India and Another, in support of his contentions.
10. The Supreme Court in the case of Raj Kumar v Union of India , has held as follows:
'But where a public servant has invited by his letter of resignation determination of his employment, his servicesnormally stand terminated from the date on which the letter of resignation is accepted by the appropriate authority and in the absence of any law or rule governing the conditions of his service to the contrary, it will not be open to the public servant to withdraw his resignation after it is accepted by the appropriate authority. Till the resignation is accepted by the appropriate authority in consonance with the rules governing the acceptance, the public servant concerned has locus paenitentiae but not thereafter'.
In the above said decision what the Supreme Court has held is that till the resignation is accepted by the appropriate authority in consonance with the rules governing the acceptance, the public servant concerned has locus paenitentiae but not thereafter.
11. In the case of Punjab National Bank, supra, it is held as follows:
'8. The result of the above interpretation is that the employee continued to be in service till the 21st April, 1986 or 30th June, 1986, on which date his services would have come normally to an end in terms of his letter dated 21st January, 1986. But, by that time, he had exercised his right to withdraw the resignation. Since the withdrawal letter was written before the resignation became effective, the resignation stands withdrawn, with the result that the respondent continues to be in the service of the bank. It is true that there is no specific provision in the regulations permitting the employee to withdraw the resignation. It is, however, not necessary that there should be any such specific rule. Until the resignation becomes effective on the terms of the letter read with Regulation 20, it is open to the employee, on general principles, to withdraw his letter of resignation. That is why, in some cases of public services, this right of withdrawal is also made subject to the permission of the employer'.
12. In the above said decision the Supreme Court has held that the employee may withdraw his proposed resignation before it becomes effective. The petitioner submitted his resignation with a request to accept the same by giving three months notice. In reply to the said notice the Corporation intimated the petitioner that the Corporation accepts the resignation as requested by him. From this correspondence, it is clear that the acceptance of resignation by the Corporation is effective from the date on which the three months period expired from the date of the receipt of letter of resignation i.e., 16-9-1991. As the petitioner in exercise of his right had withdrawn his resignation by his letter dated 10-9-1991 before the resignation became effective, the resignation stands withdrawn and he continued to be in the service of the Corporation.
13. The Supreme Court in the case of Jai Ram v Union of India, has held as follows:
'7. In view of our decision on this point, the other point practically loses its force. It may be conceded that it is open to a servant, who has expressed a desire to retire from service and applied to his superior officer to give him the requisite permission, to change his mind subsequently and ask for cancellation of the permission thus obtained; but he can be allowed to do so so long as he continues in service and not after it has terminated'.
14. In the above case it is held that the employee may be allowed to withdraw his resignation so long as he continues in service and not after the termination of service. I have already held that the petitioner was in service as on the date he had expressed his intention to withdraw the letter of resignation. Further, the petitioner was paid his salary till he was relieved i.e., 16-9-1991. If that is so it is open to the petitioner to withdraw his resignation before the termination of his service as held by the Supreme Court in the above cited decisions.
15. The learned Counsel for the respondent relied on the decision of this Court in the case of Colonel Srikantha, S.M. v Bharat Earth Movers Limited. In this case, this Court interpreting the Service Rules governing the employees of the Company has held that the offer of resignation becomes operative and effective the moment it is accepted and communicated to the employee concerned in writing. The act of relieving is only a subsequent act which has nothing to do with the act of accepting the resignation. This decision has no application to the facts of this case, firstly that there are no rules providing procedure for resignation by an employee and secondly, the acceptance of resignation, in the instant case is after the receipt of letter of withdrawal of resignation.
16. The Supreme Court in the case of Nand Keshwar Prasad v Indian Farmers Fertilizers Co-operative Limited and Others, has held as follows:
'11. After giving our careful consideration to the facts and circumstances of the case, it appears to us that the law is well-settled by this Court in a number of decisions that unless controlled by conditions of service or the statutory provisions, the retirement mentioned in the letter of resignation must take effect from the date mentioned therein and such date cannot be advanced by accepting the resignation from an earlier date when the employee concerned did not intend to retire from such earlier date. It has also been held by this Court that it is open to the employee concerned to withdraw letter of resignation before the same becomes effective'.
The petitioner by his letter had given three months advance notice of his proposed resignation. From this it is clear that the resignation takes effect on the expiry of three months from the date of letter of resignation. Therefore, the Corporation had no right to advance the said dateand accept the resignation when the petitioner did not intend to retire from service even before the expiry of three months as seen from hisletter dated 17-6-1991.
17. The contention of the petitioner is that the Corporation had accepted the resignation with effect from 16-9-1991 as per the letter of the Corporation dated 18-6-1991. Whereas, the contention of the Corporation is that the resignation of the petitioner was accepted on 18-6-1991 itself and he was relieved of his duties with effect from 16-9-1991. The letter dated 18-6-1991 as extracted above reads as follows:
'With reference to the above, the Corporation accepts your resignation and you are relieved of your duties w.e.f. 16-9-1991 as requested by you'.
(emphasis supplied)
From a reading of the said letter, I am of the view that both the acceptance of the resignation and relieving of the petitioner go together and takes effect from 16-9-1991. Therefore, the contention of the Corporation that the petitioner's resignation was accepted on 18-6-1991 cannot be accepted. If that is so, the petitioner in view of the law declared by the Supreme Court is entitled to withdraw the resignation before it becomes effective and accordingly he withdrew the resignation before the resignation became effective.
18. The Supreme Court in the case of Balram Gupta, supra, has held as follows:
'13. We hold therefore that there was no valid reason for withholding the permission by the respondent. We hold further that there has been compliance with the guidelines because the appellant has indicated that there was a change in the circumstances, namely, the persistent and personal requests from the staff members and relations which changed his attitude towards continuing in Government service and induced the appellant to withdraw the notice. In the modern and uncertain age it is very difficult to arrange one's future with any amount of certainty; a certain amount of flexibility is required, and if such flexibility does not jeopardize Government or administration, administration should be grateful enough to respond and acknowledge the flexibility of human mind and attitude and allow the appellant to withdraw his letter of retirement in the facts and circumstances of this case. Much complications which had arisen could have been thus avoided by such graceful attitude. The Court cannot but condemn circuitous ways 'to ease out' uncomfortable employees. As a model employer the Government must conduct itself with high probity and candour with its employees'.
19. In the case on hand also, the petitioner has said in his letter of withdrawal that he has already overcome all his personal problems and in the circumstances he expresses his desire to withdraw the letter of resignation. If that is so, the respondent-Corporation was not right in not permitting the petitioner to continue in his service.
20. The learned Counsel for the respondents submitted that since the Corporation has made alternate arrangement of appointing some person in place of the petitioner, it is not appropriate for this Court to direct reinstatement of the petitioner. On the date of filing of the writ petition, no appointment has been made by the Corporation in place of the petitioner. What is produced before the Court is only an advertisement calling for application to fill up the post. Therefore, if at all if there is any appointment, it is subsequent to the filing of this petition. Therefore, on this ground also it is not appropriate for this Court to deny the legitimate right of the petitioner to continue in service of the respondent-Corporation.
21. The petitioner by his resignation has created this situation. It is not known whether the petitioner has been working elsewhere during the pendency of this petition. Further, since the petitioner has not worked with the respondent-Corporation after the acceptance of resignation, I feel it is appropriate to deny the monetary benefits from the date of the acceptance of resignation till now.
22. Accordingly, writ petition is allowed. The impugned order dated 13-9-1991 (Annexure-B) is quashed.
23. Direction is issued to the respondents to reinstate the petitioner in the post held by him forthwith. The petitioner is not entitled for any monetary benefits from the date of acceptance of resignation i.e., from 16-9-1991 till this date. However, the petitioner is entitled to seniority as if he has been in service without any break.
24. Rule issued is made absolute.