Stale show-cause proceedings can be narrowed to the surviving allegation and directed to conclude within a fixed time-frame.

Stale show-cause proceedings that remained pending for decades, despite an earlier expectation of adjudication, justified supervisory directions requiring the authority to first decide whether to continue. Because the allegations had already been narrowed from connivance and consent to neglect, any further action could proceed only on that limited basis. The court also took into account the petitioners' retirement and the absence of meaningful progress, and directed completion of the matter within a fixed time-frame. The show-cause notice was not quashed, but continuation was confined to the surviving allegation and had to be concluded expeditiously.

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Issues: Whether the long pendency of the proceedings justified directing the respondents to reconsider continuation of the show-cause notice and, if pursued, confine it only to the allegation of neglect; and whether the respondents should be required to decide the matter within a fixed time-frame.

Analysis: The petition challenged a decades-old show-cause notice and the proceedings had remained at the show-cause stage despite an earlier interim order contemplating completion of adjudication. The respondents had themselves, by a subsequent communication, given up the allegations of connivance and consent and proceeded only on the footing of neglect. In view of the long lapse of time, the petitioners' retirement from service, and the absence of any meaningful progress, the respondents were directed to first decide whether they still wished to proceed. If they did, the notice could survive only on the limited question of neglect, and the proceedings were to be completed within a stipulated period.

Conclusion: The petition was disposed of with directions; the show-cause proceedings were not quashed, but any further action, if taken, was confined to neglect and had to be concluded expeditiously.

Final Conclusion: The matter was brought to an end by supervisory directions regulating the respondents' course of action, without finally adjudicating the merits of the proposed adjudication.

Ratio Decidendi: Where stale proceedings remain at the show-cause stage for an inordinate period and the authority has already narrowed the allegation, the court may require the authority to reconsider continuation of the matter and, if pursued, limit it to the surviving allegation and conclude it within a fixed time.

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