Hyderabad: The Central Administrative
Tribunal on Thursday admitted a petition filed by senior IPS
officer and Principal Secretary (Home) P Gautam Kumar
challenging the appointment of K Aravinda Rao as Director
General of Police of Andhra Pradesh.
The CAT bench comprising judicial member Bharati Ray
and administrative member R Santhanam issued notices to the
Centre, state government, Rao and other respondents asking
them to file their counters within three weeks.
The bench after hearing arguments of the petitioner
posted the matter to October 1st.
"The CAT heard our arguments and adjourned the matter
to take up main arguments on October 1," Sudhir Jonnalgadda,
counsel for Gautam Kumar, told PTI here.
"We wanted the bench to hear the matter early as the
Aravinda Rao is due to retire in ten months."
Kumar yesterday filed a petition seeking cancellation
of the appointment of his junior K Aravinda Rao as the DGP.
The officer, who belongs to the 1975 batch, in his
petition has said that he was one of the senior most IPS
officers currently serving in Andhra Pradesh.
He contended that the state government had overlooked
his seniority and also the fact that he still has two years of
service left.
The state government appointed Aravinda Rao, who
belongs to the 1977 batch, as the DGP on September 1 following
the retirement of R R Girish Kumar.
The Home Secretary argued that the promotions of 1977
batch officers in May this year were illegal as there were no
vacancies in the Director General (DG) cadre by then.
The officers who were promoted are A Sivasankar, Umesh
Kumar, Alok Srivastav, V Dinesh Reddy, M Bhaskar and M Alagar.
Except Alagar all are serving officers and made respondents.
It was the second consecutive time that Kumar was
denied the DGP`s post.
PTI
