After Pooja Khedkar Case, Supreme Court Questions Indian Railways On Hiring Of Employees

A new case was brought before the Supreme Court during the ongoing legal proceedings around Pooja Khedkar, who obtained her IAS position by using forged documents. Numerous people were hired by the railways without their documentation being verified. They didn’t even verify that the credentials and paperwork they possessed were accurate. Regarding this, the Supreme Court questioned the railways recently, voicing surprise over the hiring of certain Railway personnel based on falsified documents. According to the Supreme Court, these incidents at one of the biggest employers in India, the Railways, should be looked into.

A panel of Justices JK Maheshwari and Sanjay Karol was handling a situation involving the dismissal of several Eastern Railway personnel, who had been appointed on compassionate grounds. They expressed amazement at this and questioned how someone could be appointed to a government position without a thorough inquiry and certificate verification. These individuals were hired based solely on compassion. According to the Supreme Court, they were fired because their appointment was granted based on falsified and counterfeit paperwork.

“Looking at the facts of this case, we are quite surprised at the railways,” the bench stated in the verdict. It further added: “Had the inquiry been conducted sooner, leading to the eventual discovery that the documents were fraudulent, falsified, and altered, this appointment might not have taken place. Without doing a thorough investigation and document verification, how can someone be appointed to a government position? Since railways employ a substantial portion of the workforce in the nation, these kinds of mishaps ought to be avoided.”

The Centre’s appeal against the August 2012 ruling of the Calcutta High Court was being heard by the court. According to the Supreme Court, the Railways had sent these workers show cause notices, enquiring as to why their employment should not be terminated on compassionate grounds because they had accepted their positions using false and fraudulent information about their father’s employment. The authorities dismissed them after receiving their response after discovering that the appointments were made using fake, falsified, and forged documents.

According to the bench, people whose families are extremely upset or impoverished as a result of the incapacity or death of the primary earner are appointed on compassionate grounds. Such jobs cannot be allowed to be kept when individuals seeking appointments on such grounds attempt to falsify their eligibility.