JUDGMENT 1. THE writ petitioner's then wife Mrs. Sumita banerjee, allegedly deserted him in 1974 and she has since been living, again allegedly, in adultery, 2. THE writ petitioner, earlier a Christian by faith converted himself to Arya Samaj and married his present wife Pranati Banerjee in 1978. The information of his second marriage was given to the Secretary and the Deputy Chairman In the month of February 1978 itself which was the month of writ petitioner's second marriage. 3. THE confidential contemporenous note in that regard is annexed to the writ petition (Page 87) 4. THEREAFTER, as late as on 16th September, 1992, i.e. 14 years after the marriage in issue the Writ petitioner was served with a notice why departmental proceedings should not be started against him. Within a month of receipt of that notice he gave his answer. 5. THEN there was another big gap of time, not 14 years this time but 5. 6. IN 1997, 14. 8. 97 to be exact, the impugned charge-sheet was served. The charge-sheet mentions completely wrong rules. 7. THE writ petitioner is an employee of the Tea Board which is set up under a Central Act and which is not the Central Government although it is an Article 12 authority 8. THE rule applicable to the writ petitioner would be rule No. 20 of the Tea Board Employees (Conduct) By-Laws, 1958". The said rule is set out below : "20. Bigamous marriage. (1) No employee who has a wife living shall contract another marriage without first obtaining the permission of the Board, notwithstanding that such subsequent marriage is permissible under the persona] law for the time being applicable to him. (2) No female employee shall marry any person who has a wife having without first obtaining the permission of the Board. " The show-cause mentions in no terms in Article 1 that "shri banerjee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . has contravened the provisions of Rule 3 (l) (iii) and rule 21 (2) of the Central Civil Services (conduct) Rules, 1964. " 9. AT the end of Article 11 of the charges there is an identical statement containing a reference again to the misquoted rule. 10. THAT misquoted rule although very similar to the rule quoted above is not quite identical. " 9. AT the end of Article 11 of the charges there is an identical statement containing a reference again to the misquoted rule. 10. THAT misquoted rule although very similar to the rule quoted above is not quite identical. Rule 21 of the CCS Rules is set out below: "21. Restriction regarding Marriage.- (1) No Government servant shall enter into, or contract, a marriage with a person having a spouse living; and (2) No Government servant having a spouse living, shall enter into, or contract, a marriage with any person : provided that the Central Government may permit a Government servant to enter into, or contract any such marriage as is referred to in clause (1) or clause (2), if it is satisfied that (a) such marriage is permissible under the personal law applicable to such Government servant and the other party to the marriage; and (b) there are other grounds for It is also to be noted that in the statement of imputation annexed to the charge-sheet being the Memorandum dated 14. 8. 97 it is specifically alleged that "sri Ranajoy Banerjee has committed the offence of bigamy. 11. THE enquiry is still proceeding. There has been no finding against the writ petitioner yet. The writ petitioner applied for legal assistance at the departmental proceeding. Such assistance was depart mentally refused. The writ petitioner moved an application in aid of this writ seeking compulsive orders of Court so that he could have the assistance of a legal practitioner in the department. At the interlocutory stages of that interlocutory application I did not pass any compulsive order but directed reconsideration of the matter. On reconsideration the Chairman maintained his earlier decision of refusing legal representation in the departmental proceeding. The application is also being heard with the writ after filing of affidavits in both matters. 12. IN my opinion, the first ground on which the writ should succeed is the ground of the intervening inordinate lapse of time. That the writ petitioner had gone through a second marriage ceremony was, or at least should have been, known to the Tea Board right from 1978. Nothing was hidden. Information full and complete was furnished immediately on marriage. The writ petitioner has since got promotion and increment more than once. He was deputed to Australia where he travelled with his wife and that too in the service of the Tea Board. Nothing was hidden. Information full and complete was furnished immediately on marriage. The writ petitioner has since got promotion and increment more than once. He was deputed to Australia where he travelled with his wife and that too in the service of the Tea Board. His wife's expenses were then reimbursed. Every fact was known. Yet the Tea Board kept silent for fourteen and then for five years. The explanation of the Tea Board has been that there was a Central vigilance Commission investigation, and a report of that investigation, and as a result of that report of investigation, the departmental proceeding was started. 13. THE writ petitioner is not to know when the Vigilance Officers will be active or when they will not be. The writ petitioner is not to know when departmental proceedings will be initiated against him or when those will be kept in abeyance. In a situation like this the mandate of Article 14 is quite clear, and it is this, that if all facts are/or should be known to the Tea Board, on the basis of which the departmental proceedings can be initiated according to the Tea Board or enquiries can be made by the Tea Board, then those enquiries should be made and proceedings initiated within a reasonable time after the information has reached the tea Board or its responsible officers and employees. 14. IT is not open to the Board to choose its own time for initiation of the proceeding. The report of the Central Vigilance Commission, whenever it might come cannot override the mandates of Article 14. If in two similarly circumstanced cases the Tea Board were to be free to proceed depart mentally, in one case immediately, and in another case after 15 years it might well pave the way to arbitrariness and ways of spoiling a successful career when it is almost built. Article 14 does not permit this to be done. If the Court finds that there has been an inordinately long gap of time which is not reasonable by any standard, then the Court must take appropriate action. It my opinion waiting for 14 years and then waiting for 5 years is too much waiting, so much so that it would be contrary to the mandate of reasonableness contained in Article: 14 to permit The Tea Board to proceed with this enquiry at all. 15. It my opinion waiting for 14 years and then waiting for 5 years is too much waiting, so much so that it would be contrary to the mandate of reasonableness contained in Article: 14 to permit The Tea Board to proceed with this enquiry at all. 15. A point urged on behalf of the Tea Board was that the writ petitioner has some against the show-cause notice only. It is well known that at the stage of a show-cause a proceeding cannot be stopped unless there is some excess of jurisdiction or some other perversity disclosed which cuts at the very root of the show-cause notice. 16. SERVING a show-cause notice contrary to the mandate of Article 14 is acting ultra vires the Constitution. If the show-cause notice is so unreasonably delayed as to violate Article 14 then the show-cause notice not only can be, but should be nipped in the bud. This is what I propose to do. There is another point of substance involved which also helps the writ petitioner. It is not that this point has been urged on behalf of the writ petitioner but a writ Court is not. necessarily limited to the points urged by learned counsel or mentioned in the writ petition but can take note of legal points which arise out of admitted facts. 17. A reading of Rule 20 of the Tea Board's Rules quoted above would show that the ingredient of the departmental offence is two fold : (1) that a second marriage ceremony has been gone through; and (2) the permission of the Tea Board has not been obtained in regard thereto. 18. THE permission, as per rule, is not described as a written permission. What sort of permission will suffice is a question which we need not enter into. But the non-granting of permission by the Tea Board is as much an ingredient of the departmental offence as is the second marriage ceremony itself. If there is a second marriage while the first spouse is living and if the Tea Board has not granted permission a show-cause under Rule 20 might issue But the Tea Board must make a positive assertion in the show-cause that it has not granted any such permission before if it is allowed to serve it and take away the night's sleep of the employee in question. The assertion or the averment that the Tea Board did not grant any permission to the writ petitioner is significantly absent from the memorandum or the charge-sheet which contains several sheets and several annexures. The absence of this averment or imputation might very probably be deliberate but in any event it is a fatal and substantial defect. 19. IT is possible that the Tea Board was in two minds as to whether it had or had not granted permission to the writ petitioner's marriage. After all the information was given in time, after all the writ petitioner had worked on for nearly two decades with an ever brightening prospect, and the Tea Board had accepted all services from the writ petitioner. Nobody can blame the Tea Board if some members thought that permission was granted to the writ petitioner, even if not expressly by Mishra as named and alleged by the writ petitioner, yet by implication and silence by not taking any steps against the writ petitioner for long years after his second marriage. 20. BUT then there is the Vigilance Commission's report. If the Tea Board and its concerned officers do not proceed on the report something might happen to them. So, a proceeding has to be initiated. The proceeding must mean that the second marriage was without the Tea Board's consent, because if consent is given the departmental offence is non est. The only way, therefore to save skin is to issue a show-cause notice and yet keep silent about the vital aspect of the Tea Board's permission. This silence in the show-cause renders this insufficient. It is so insufficient that even if every word of the show-cause is left unchallenged it yet does not amount to a departmental offence for breach of Rule 20. This is because the absence of the Tea Board's permission is not specifically and clearly averred. A show-cause notice can be struck down if it discloses no departmental offence at all. This is such a case, and the show-cause notice must fail on this ground also. 21. NOW comes the question of costs, it is alleged in the departmental show-cause that: the writ petitioner has committed big v. It is not for the department to try the writ petitioner for a criminal offence. The department has no jurisdiction to use. This is such a case, and the show-cause notice must fail on this ground also. 21. NOW comes the question of costs, it is alleged in the departmental show-cause that: the writ petitioner has committed big v. It is not for the department to try the writ petitioner for a criminal offence. The department has no jurisdiction to use. the word "bigamy" except to a by sense, it has jurisdiction to proceed in regard to a breach of Rule 20, and that is all The respondents have sought to proceed for such breach after 14 or 19 years. They have served a show-cause which is incomplete in averments; they are going on with, the enquiry and the enquiry has been kept completely at the lay level. The trouble which all UBS has caused the writ petitioner is not very hard to imagine. This is a case where the writ petitioner Is entitled to costs on the normal rule, that caste should follow the result The attempt of obtaining legal representation and for making applications in that regard cannot also toe termed, as an undue attempt because the writ petitioner's whole life and career were at stake. On that application for legal representation no separate order is passed, but that will abide by this order on the writ petition itself, in which the writ petitioner succeeds fully in substance. There will thus be role absolute in terms of prayers (a), (b) and (c) of the writ petition. There will also be a permanent order in terms of prayer (d ). The writ petitioner will be entitled to the costs of this writ petition and all applications incidental hereto compendiously assessed at Rs. 2,50,000/ -. I must mention that when specifically put the query and learned Counsel of the writ petitioner, asked him in Court, his answer was that he only wants relief and no costs; this only shows how scared and how troubled the writ petitioner is. That the writ petitioner does not and dares not press for costs is no reason why the Court should not grant it and compensate him for the wrongs and troubles suffered, so far as it is possible to do so in the shape of payment of money. 22. AN parties and all others concerned to act on a signed xerox copy of this dictated order on the usual undertakings. Writ petition allowed.