“You cannot be drunk on duty”, says SC to BSF jawan upholding his dismissal from service

New Delhi, Apr 8 PTIThe Supreme Court on Friday refused to interfere with a plea of ex-Border Security Force personnel, who was dismissed from service for being drunk on duty.You have pleaded guilty, you were intoxicated during duty.

New Delhi, Apr 8 (PTI)The Supreme Court on Friday refused to interfere with a plea of ex-Border Security Force personnel, who was dismissed from service for being drunk on duty.

“You have pleaded guilty, you were intoxicated during duty. Your plea is that you were disturbed and you go and grab a bottle of liquor. What can we do here? We will not interfere,” said a bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and Aniruddha Bose.

The counsel appearing for the BSF jawan said that courts and the concerned authorities had not taken into account various rules of the BSF on dismissal of service.

“You have yourself pleaded guilty. You admitted that you were intoxicated now, What can we do? You were in Border Security Force”, the bench said, adding that it is not going to interfere with the decision of dismissal of service, which has been affirmed by the Director-General of BSF and the High Court. The counsel said that punishment is too harsh for being drunk on duty.

The bench said, “Obviously, it would be harsh, you cannot be drunk on duty while being in Border Security Force. There are some offences, where we would not like to interfere”.

The Jawan was dismissed from service after he was found guilty on the basis of two charges sheets which included charges under sections 40 and 26 of the Border Security Forces Act for intoxication.

The jawan had pleaded guilty to the charges after which in compliance with the BSF rules, he was dismissed from service on April 1, 2016.

The order of dismissal was appealed before the Director-General of BSF but it was dismissed.

The matter then reached the Meghalaya High Court which also affirmed the decision of dismissal from service. PTI MNL MNL RKS RKS