3 decades on, HC sets aside retrospective resignation acceptance

Nearly three decades after an employee’s resignation was accepted with retrospective effect despite its prior withdrawal, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has held the decision to be without jurisdiction and contrary to settled legal principles. The court quashed the order dated September 6, 1994, and directed that the petitioner be treated as in service with entitlement to 50 per cent back wages.

The ruling by Justice Harsimran Singh Sethi came on a petition filed in 2001 by a senior accountant, who initially tendered his resignation on November 1, 1993, with effect from December 1, 1993. But the employer did not accept the resignation and asked him to clear outstanding house-building loan dues. The resignation remained in limbo for months until the petitioner withdrew it on August 8, 1994. Yet, the competent authority on September 6, 1994, accepted the resignation with retrospective effect.

The petitioner challenged the action before UT Labour Court, which dismissed the reference on the ground that he did not fall under the definition of a ‘workman.’ The matter subsequently reached the high court, where the petitioner contended that the retrospective acceptance of resignation, after its withdrawal, was legally untenable.

Deciding the case in just two hearings, Justice Sethi categorically ruled that resignation did not take effect unless accepted through a specific order. "There is no deeming fiction of the acceptance of the resignation once given by an employee," the court observed. It further emphasised that the acceptance of resignation with retrospective effect was impermissible under service rules.

"Once the rules governing the service do not envisage the retrospective acceptance of resignation, the acceptance of the same cannot be done retrospectively," Justice Sethi asserted, while referring to Rule 14 of the HAFED Common Cadre Rules, 1988.

Justice Sethi also clarified that the master-servant relationship continued until a resignation was accepted by the competent authority. "A bare perusal of the rule would show that till the resignation is accepted by the competent authority, the master and servant relationship does not come to an end. In the present case, acceptance of resignation dated November 1, 1993, was only done on September 6, 1994. Hence, the position is to be seen as on September 6, 1994, as to whether the competent authority had the jurisdiction to accept the resignation or not."

Justice Sethi also reinforced the principle that a resignation could be withdrawn at any time before it was formally accepted. "Once a resignation which is sought to be accepted had already been withdrawn by the petitioner, there was no jurisdiction with the authority concerned to accept the same with retrospective effect so as to overcome the withdrawal of the resignation by the employee concerned."

Setting aside the impugned order, the court observed that normally an employee was entitled to all consequential benefits, once an order was quashed. But the petitioner was honest to the court. The employee agreed to he had worked in another institution for some duration and would be satisfied in case 50 per cent back wages were given.