New delhi, Oct 27: Upping the ante against public enterprise selection board on the appointment of MTNL Chairman and Managing Director, the Indian Telecom Services Association (ITSA) today said it has filed a petition in the Delhi High Court seeking a stay on the issue. "We have filed a petition in delhi high court, which is yet to be admitted. We have sought that the appointment of MTNL CMD is done on the basis of eligibility criteria laid down by the Cabinet," ITSA President J R Gupta told reporters.
The Union Cabinet has laid down the criteria for appointment of CMD of the MTNL, Gupta said, adding that "in case Government goes ahead with the appointment of R S P Sinha, currently Finance Director of MTNL, as the CMD, we will seek transfer of 153 cadre-based officials back to department of telecom which have been on deputation with MTNL." MTNL'S current CMD Narinder Sharma is retiring on October 31 and ITSA officials said that Sinha's name is believed to be on the number one in the list of probable candidates for the post. According to the association, Sinha has no experience in operation, maintenance and development of public telecom network and "we feel that head of organisation like MTNL should be a telecom professional of high level of experience". Bureau Report