Subsequent acquittal does not automatically entitle an employee dismissed on conviction to back wages.

The petitioner, an employee of the Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation Ltd. (KPTCL), was convicted by a Division Bench of the Karnataka High Court on 5 January 2024, following which he was dismissed from service on 21 March 2024.

The Supreme Court subsequently set aside the conviction and restored the trial court’s acquittal on 3 September 2025.

KPTCL withdrew the dismissal and reinstated him from 3 November 2025, but treated the intervening period—from 21 March 2024 to 2 November 2025—as not spent on duty and denied salary for that period.

The petitioner challenged that decision, seeking salary and consequential service benefits

1. Whether the petitioner was entitled to salary for the period he remained out of service following his conviction, which was later set aside on appeal

2. Whether the respondents’ decision to deny salary for that period warranted interference under Article 226 of the Constitution

The Court applied the principle of “no work, no pay” and the Supreme Court’s decisions in Union of India v. Jaipal Singh, (2004) 1 SCC 121, SBI v. Mohd. Abdul Rahim, (2013) 11 SCC 67, and Raj Narain v. Union of India, 2019 SCC OnLine SC 452.

These authorities establish that subsequent acquittal does not, by itself, entitle an employee dismissed following a criminal conviction to back wages for the intervening period where the employee’s non-employment was not attributable to the employer.

The Court distinguished cases where an employer’s own action prevented the employee from working: in such cases, “no work, no pay” may not apply

The petitioner’s dismissal followed his criminal conviction, and the respondents had not independently prevented him from performing his duties.

The Court therefore treated his absence from service as resulting from the conviction and the resulting disability to serve, rather than from an employer-caused exclusion.

Although the Supreme Court later restored the acquittal and the petitioner was reinstated, that did not make the respondents liable for salary for the period when they could not avail themselves of his services.

The Court accordingly applied “no work, no pay” and found no basis to interfere with the impugned endorsement

Finding no warrant to interfere with the respondents’ decision, it rejected the writ petition