Cannot Withdraw Resignation Once It Is Accepted: Madhya Pradesh High Court Refuses Relief To Police Constable Who Resigned In 1994

The Madhya Pradesh High Court, Jabalpur Bench, has emphatically laid down that once the application for resignation of an employee has been accepted, there cannot be any withdrawal of the same. 

"...once the resignation was accepted, there cannot be any withdrawal as the bilateral relationship of Master and Servant has seized to exist," Justice Vivek Agarwal declared recently, while considering the plea of a Police Constable who sought reinstatement in service, sixteen years after his resignation had been accepted. 

The petitioner averred that he had submitted his application for resignation in 1994 due to the 'torture' that had been meted out to him while in service. He submitted that his subsequent application for reinstatement which had been moved in 2010, had been disallowed by the Director General of Police, Police Headquarters. 

He thus approached the Court seeking the issuance of directions to the respondent authorities to reinstate him in service, with all consequential benefits and interest @ 14 % per annum.

The respondents asserted that since the petitioner himself had submitted his resignation to the Superintendent of Police, there was no provision for his reinstatement, pursuant to the acceptance of the resignation.

The panel lawyer for the respondent's Advocate Arnav Tiwari further submitted that the present plea had been filed 19 years after the petitioner's resignation had been accepted in June 1994. 

The Court noted that despite counselling, and the initial reluctance of the respondents to accept the petitioner's resignation letter, the latter refused to take back his request for voluntary retirement, which eventually came to be accepted. 

On the question as to whether the Government could now permit such an employee to withdraw such an application for voluntary resignation, the Court took note that in P. Lal v. Union of India (2003), the Apex Court had laid down that the moment the Government accepted the notice for voluntary retirement, the retirement would become effective and the relationship of Master and Servant would stand severed.

"The law in regard to resignation is that concept is bilateral and requires acceptance and it follows that offer of resignation can be withdrawn before acceptance as is held by the Supreme Court in Union of India Vs. Gopal Chandra Misra AIR 1978 SC 694, Ravindra Singh Vs. State of M.P. (1995) 3 SLJ 65 (SC) and thus, it is evident that once resignation was made and it was accepted, then its withdrawal after acceptance is not permissible as held in case of G. Kailashapathi Rao Vs. Committee of Bandlamudi Hanumayanama Hindu Degree Junior College for Women 1994 (2) SLR 554 (AP)," Justice Tiwari observed. 

The Court thus ascertained that the respondents' refusal to accept the the petitioner's request to permit him to be reinstated could therefore not be faulted with. 

The plea was thus dismissed. 

Citation: 2024 LiveLaw (MP) 4

Case Title: Madhav Prasad Pandey v. State of Madhya Pradesh & Ors. 

Case Number: WRIT PETITION No. 938 of 2013

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