Hyderabad: The Central Administrative
Tribunal (CAT) here today set aside the appointment of R R
Girish Kumar as the DGP of Andhra Pradesh.
Acting on a petition filed by S S P Yadav and A K
Mohanty, predecessors of Girish Kumar, the Hyderabad bench of
CAT directed the state government to constitute a selection
committee to appoint a new chief of the state police in two
weeks.
The committee would select a panel of three members
who in turn will choose the DGP in accordance with rules duly
considering the candidature of all the officers in DGP grade.
The state government should keep in view the
observations made by the tribunal, the order said.
The tribunal also ordered the Government to release
the due amounts to both the senior IPS officers as they were
transferred to low pay scale posts.
S S P Yadav, a 1974 batch IPS officer, approached the
CAT in October last year challenging the appointment of R R
Girish Kumar, a 1976-batch IPS officer, as the state DGP.
Yadav was transferred as MD of the state-owned Road
Transport Corporation.
Irked by the government's move, he filed a petition in
the CAT that "Girish Kumar was illegally promoted as DGP with
apex pay scale."
Kumar, till then, was holding the post of additional
DG and was promoted to facilitate him for DGP post.
Similarly another DGP rank officer, A K Mohanty also
moved CAT, alleging that he was removed from the post without
any valid reason.
He, now the chairman of the State Road Safety
Authority, alleged that he was posted in a low pay scale rank.
The tribunal, while quashing the government orders
appointing Girish Kumar as DGP of the state, also said that
"the appointment in apex scale is illegal and arbitrary."
In case of Mohanty's petition, the CAT said that the
DGP post he held covered only election period and hence he
cannot claim the benefits of Supreme Court's direction
regarding the selection and transfer of DGP.
The tribunal said that Kumar is eligible to apex scale
only from December 10, 2009, when the fifth post of DGP was
sanctioned by the Central Government.
It observed that the post of DGP is "promotional post"
and the government has the power of transferring the DGP to
any other cadre or ex-cadre post in the DGP cadre without
affecting his legal and constitutional rights.
PTI
First Published: Thursday, January 28, 2010, 18:52