HC awards 1 week jail to two bank officials for contempt

The Madras High Court has sentenced two senior officials of a public sector bank to one week's simple imprisonment for committing contempt of court.
Justice M V Muralidaran allowed the contempt petition filed by S V Chennakrishnan, an employee of the Indian Overseas Bank here, against the officials for not obeying the court's May 25 last order staying disciplinary proceedings against him.
The Judge, in his order yesterday, also imposed a fine of Rs 2,000 each on Chief Manager-cum-Disciplinary Authority K S Ganapathy Subramanian and Chief Manager-cum-Conduct and Disciplinary Action Cell N Subramanian.
He said the officials had acted in a "hasty manner" and dismissed the petitioner, ignoring the court order.

Holding that they had "wilfully and intentionally" violated the court's order, the judge awarded the two simple imprisonment for one week.
The court ordered the contemnors to deposit the fine with the Tamil Nadu Mediation and Conciliation Centre immediately and directed the Registry to ensure that the two underwent imprisonment.

The Disciplinary Authority of the bank had initiated action against the petitioner and some of his colleagues in connection with an alleged recruitment scam.
The high court had stayed the disciplinary proceedings following which the Disciplinary Authority filed a petition seeking vacating it. The court had reserved orders on this plea on May 30, 2016.

Meanwhile, the Disciplinary Authority had issued the order of dismissal the next day after which the petitioner moved the court accusing the officicials of having committed contempt of court.