Chhattisgarh High Court Upholds Penalty Stopping Increments To SBI Employee Accused Of Sexually Harassing Staff, Customers

In this regard, a division bench of Chief Justice Ramesh Sinha and Justice Arvind Kumar Verma held,

“From the records, it has been further reflected that the disciplinary enquiry has been conducted by the Competent Authority and there is no allegation with regard to competence of the authority. Initially, the punishment of penalty of lowering two increments from his present pay scale with cumulative effect till retirement was imposed which was modified by the Appellate Authority to stoppage of two increments with cumulative effect, thus, the penalty inflicted is neither shocking nor disproportionate.”

The writ appeal was filed by the Customer Assistant at SBI Branch (appellant/petitioner) challenging an order of a Single Judge dismissing his writ petition.

Initially, the appellant was accused of misbehaving with a lady customer of the Bank, after which an inquiry was initiated and the Investigating Officer considered the following allegations against the appellant— misbehaviour with customer, staff and colleagues, sexual harassment of employees/customers, delay in customer service, passing of derogatory remarks on lady customers, and habitual late coming and argumentative attitude.

He was alleged to have created a negative atmosphere in the branch affecting its business and subsequently disrupting the bank's discipline. Thereafter, the Chairperson of the Internal Complaints Committee on Sexual Harassment recommended disciplinary action against him.

In the disciplinary inquiry instituted against him, which concluded on 31.12.2016, the appellant was found guilty of 3 charges and 3 other charges were partially proved. However, taking a sympathetic view, the Disciplinary Authority inflicted a penalty of lowering two increments from his present pay scale with cumulative effect till retirement and further penalty was inflicted to the effect that he would not be eligible for increment for a period of 2 years.

Aggrieved, the appellant appealed to the DGM (B & O), Raipur Module, who revised the punishment and enhanced the penalty to stoppage of two increments with cumulative effect. When the appellant approached the High Court, his writ petition was dismissed vide the impugned order, leading to the present writ appeal.

It was the case of the appellant that the allegations levelled against him were false and that the statements of victims were not recorded and the appellant was not given an opportunity to cross examine those witnesses.

On the contrary, the respondents argued that the allegations against the appellant were serious in nature, the allegations of sexual harassment being authenticated by the Chairperson of the Internal Complaints Committee on Sexual Harassment, with 3 allegations being proven in entirety and the other 3 being partially proved.

The Court noted that modification of punishment by the Appellant Authority was justified. Dismissing the writ petition, the Division Bench held,

“Taking into account the overall facts and circumstances of the case, we are of the firm view that learned Single Judge has passed the impugned order with cogent and justifiable reasons and as such, we are not inclined to interfere with the impugned order passed by the learned Single Judge in Writ Petition (S) No.3958 of 2018 (Ram Krishna Soni v. Chairman-Cum-Managing Director and others).”

Case Details:

Case Number: WA No. 292 of 2025

Case Title: Ram Krishna Soni v. Chairman-Cum-Managing Director National Banking Division Group and Others

Click Here To Read/Download Order