It is true that-

(a) A person authorised to award a punishment can always entrust an enquiry to a person who is not so authorised (Pradyat Kumar Bose v. Honble the Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court, A.I.R. 1956 S.C. 285=(1955) 2 S.C.R. 1331); and

(b) The entire proceedings beginning from the show cause notice, framing of the charges and the conduct of the enquiry and ending with the report and final show cause notice of punishment, must con­form to certain well accepted principles of natural justice, that is, that—

(i) The enquiring officer must be unbiased and should not prejudge the case, and

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(ii) The enquiry also must be fair and impartial by giving full op­portunity to the delinquent to plead and establish his case.

Even where it is not alleged that the punishing authority:-

(a) Is not biased; or

(b) Has not in any way violated the principles of natural justice?

(c) Has not transgressed any of the accepted principles upon which fair and impartial enquiries have to be held,

The fact that he acts upon a report of an enquiry conducted by an officer who-

(i) Is biased; or

(ii) Has violated the principles of natural justice; or

(iii) Has prejudged the case,

Would nonetheless vitiate the finding and punishment.

The principle of natural justice is equally applicable to enquiries under Article 311 of the Constitution as they are to administrative tribunals and administrative enquiries. The principle of natural justice would include within it-

(a) Impartiality of hearing process, and

(b) The conducting of proceedings in good faith.

While it may not be permissible to probe into the mental process of the enquiring officer or the person charged with making an ad­ministrative decision, but nonetheless where bias or prejudice is ob­vious even before the enquiry commenced so as to raise a strong feeling in the mind of the delinquent that he has no hope of a fair trial, then the principle that justice should not only be done but seem to be done, has its full impact upon the validity of the proceedings.

It is true that the process in administrative enquiries need not follow the ideals and patterns of regular courts of law. As observed by Mr. Justice P.B Mukerji of the Calcutta High Court in an article “Administrative Law” (published in the Journal of the Indian Law Institute, October 1958, Vol. I, Part No. 1):

(i) The climate of the Court,

(ii) The climate of the orthodox jurisprudence,

(iii) The pattern of the judicial procedure and the judicial en­vironment, and

(iv) The anatomy of the judicial process are all basically different from those of-

(i) The administrative court,

(ii) The administrative agencies,

(ii) The administrative process, and

(iv) The administrative technique.

To judicialise the administrative process is one way to defeat the new demand, and to fly against the very reason for the growth and development of the administrative law.”

But nonetheless there can be no doubt that certain basic prin­ciples of natural justice apply to administrative enquiries as to judi­cial enquiries, (a) A person who has conducted a preliminary enquiry and found a prima facie case for a regular enquiry, will not be per­mitted to conduct the regular enquiry, because he has already in some way formed an opinion in the case; or (b) where an administrative su­perior has expressed definite views on the conduct of a delinquent of­ficer, he will not be permitted to hold an enquiry. (See Subba Rao v. State of Hyderabad, A.I.R. 1957 Andh. Pra. 414 (D.B.): 1937 Andh. L.T.I 55).

The facts in each case will have to be taken into consideration in determining whether there is a violation of the principles of natural justice and fair hearing.

The Deputy Superintendent of Police (the Enquiring Officer) in his charge memo, dated June 17, 1960, expressed in categorical terms his opinion or verdict that the employees (plaintiffs a Head Con­stable and a police constable) had abused their position and brought discredit to the department.

The Charge Memo indicated the final punishment of dismissal. The said Enquiring Officer passed the or­ders of dismissal of the plaintiffs on 13th Sept. 1960.

The question is whether the expression of any comment upon the alleged actions of the delinquents or of the proposed punishment in the very first show cause notice before enquiry would vitiate the en­quiry and the finding. The plaintiff filed the two suits in the Munsif s Court, impugning the validity of the orders of dismissal dated 13th Sept. 1960.

It must be held that, in the cases on hand, the Deputy Superin­tendent of Police had, in the Charge-memos, stated that the delin­quents ‘has abused their position and brought discredit to the department.’

That was a categorical opinion and that indicated bias or, at any rate, a fear or apprehension in the minds of the delinquents that they have no hope or chance of fair trial. To say that the delin­quents did not protest at that time is to ignore the fact that they being in service in the lowest rank may have entertained a fear of an­tagonising the superior.

At any rate, that cannot be a matter which can be taken into consideration in determining whether the proceed­ings have been validly initiated. Therefore, the expression of an opinion by the enquiring officer in the charge-memos that the delin­quents had abused their position brought discredit to the department would vitiate the proceedings.

Where the Tribunal seems to have been greatly impressed by the fact that, instead of appointing someone in the appellant’s factory it­self as the Enquiry Officer, the Works Manager had brought in an outsider who was no other than a junior advocate, occasionally assist­ing their counsel in some matters,-

(a) The Tribunal’s view that this wholly unwarranted and done with the purpose of loading the dice against the workmen, appears to be unreasonable;

(b) Merely because the Enquiry Officer was a junior advo­cate and that he had on occasions been engaged by the appellant, it is not possible to take the view that he would necessarily be biased against the workmen.

Evidently, some of the workmen had behaved rudely to some members in the managerial cadre, and it would not have been at all difficult for the Works Manager to appoint, as Enquiry Officer, some person of the factory itself over whom he was likely to have greater influence than on an outsider.

As the Works Manager was going to be a witness in the inquiry, he entrusted the appointment of the En­quiry Officer to the Director of the Company-appellant. There is nothing unfair in this, and no exception to the course adopted can be taken.

In Saran Motors v. Vishwanath, (1964) 2 Lab. L.J. 139 (S.C.): (1964) 9 Fac. L.R. 7, the Supreme Court rejected the objection as to bias of the enquiry officer upheld by the tribunal on the ground that the enquiry officer had at times been engaged by the appellant as a lawyer in industrial matter and had been entrusted with the work of holding enquiries on some previous occasions observing that the mere fact of a person’s occasional employment as a lawyer by the employer did not render him incompetent to hold a domestic enquiry.

The doctrine of bias excluded in a case of necessity, that is, where the statute confers jurisdiction only on one officer and no other officer has jurisdiction.

It was held by the Supreme Court in the case of Ashok Kumar Yadav v. State ofHaryana, A.I.R. 1987 S.C. 454 that-

(a) If a Selection Committee is constituted for the purpose of selection candidates on merits and one of the members of the Selec­tion Committee is closely related to a candidate appearing for the selecting, it would not be enough for such member merely to withdraw from the entire selection process and ask the authorities to nominate another person in his place on the Selection Committee, be­cause, otherwise, all the selections made would be vitiated on account of reasonable likelihood of bias affecting the process of selection.

(b) But the principle which requires that a member of a Selec­tion Committee whose close relative is appearing for selection, should-

(i) Decline to become a member of the Selection Commit­tee; or

(ii) Withdraw from it leaving it to the appointing authority to nominate another person in his place,

Need not be applied in the case of a Constitutional Authority like the Public Service Commission, whether central or State.

(c) If a member of a Public Service Commission were to withdraw altogether from the selection process on the ground that a close relative of his is appearing for selection, no other person save a member can be substituted in his place. And it may sometimes hap­pen that no other member is available to take the place of such mem­ber and the functioning of the Public Service Commission may be affected.

When two or more members of a Public Service Commis­sion are holding a viva examination, they are functioning not as individuals but the Public Service Commission.

Of course, when a close relative of a member of a Public Service Commission is appear­ing for interview, such member must withdraw from participation in the interview of that candidate and must not take part in any discussion in regard to the merits of that candidate and even the marks on credits given to that candidate should not be disclosed to him.