Madras HC drops TNUSRB head in suo motu proceedings

Chennai: Noting that the chairman of the Tamil Nadu Uniformed Services Recruitment Board has no personal knowledge about the incident leading to the alleged TNUSRB examination row, the Madras high court has dropped his name and substituted the name of N.K.Senthamarai Kannan, IPS, Member Secretary/Inspector General of Police, TNUSRB, as contemnor in the suo motu contempt proceedings initiated by the court earlier.

"Considering the submission as well as the affidavit filed by J.K.Tripathy, IPS, in the suo motu contempt petition, this court is inclined to drop the name of J.K.Tripathy, IPS and accordingly, substitute the name of N.K.Senthamarai Kannan, IPS, Member Secretary/IG of Police, TNUSRB as Contemnor in Suo Motu Contempt Petition", said Justice S.M.Subramaniam.

The judge had on April 2, initiated the suo motu contempt proceedings after finding that the act of the TNUSRB in misguiding the court and filing a bogus expert opinion to a disputed question, resulted in dismissal of a petition, are to be construed as an obstruction caused for administration of justice and consequently resulted in miscarriage of justice.

The judge said additional advocate general P. H. Arvindh Pandian submitted that the Board consists of DGP as Chairman, Additional Director General of Police as Member and Inspector General of Police as Member Secretary.

The IG of Police/Member Secretary was assigned with the work of conducting written examination and further process of recruitment with due approval of the Board on policy matters and other administrative issues.

The drawing of panel members for setting up of questions, moderation, evaluation and obtaining expert opinions for any question in dispute in the question paper were strictly kept confidential and looked after solely by the IG of Police/Member Secretary in order to maintain absolute confidentiality in the recruitment process. It was asserted that the Chairman has no involvement in summoning the experts Dr. G. Vijayakumar alias G. V .Kumar and D.Murthy. The chairman has no personal knowledge and not acquainted with any of these facts connected with the subject matter of the petition. However, the Chairman undertakes that adequate steps will be taken to ensure such events do not happen in future. Beyond this, AAG submitted that actions will be taken in a swift manner in respect of the involvement of the officials in the office of the Board and report also will be submitted before this court during the next hearing date, the judge added.

The judge said the Member Secretary/IG of Police was substituted in the place of the chairman in view of the fact that the Chairman has no personal knowledge about the particular incident as well as the document produced before this court and this apart, there was no element of mens rea on the part of the Chairman.

"Thus, the chairman is exonerated from the Suo motu contempt proceedings and Member Secretary/IG of Police is substituted in the place of the Chairman, representing the TNUSRB", the judge added. The judge said advocate general Vijay Narayan submitted that court monitored investigation can be ordered in order to cull out the truth in the interest of the judicial proceedings as well as to render justice.

"This court is of the considered opinion that the Commissioner of Police, who is heading the Central Crime Branch, at Greater Chennai, will be the appropriate authority to conduct or monitor the investigation personally and submit a report during the next hearing. This court repose confidence on the Commissioner of Police, who in turn, is expected to consider the sensitiveness involved in this matter and conduct an independent investigation/enquiry as the high level police officers are also to be interrogated or enquired or examined by the Commissioner of Police. The Commission of Police, is expected to conduct the investigation in respect of the official procedures followed in the office of the Board and the manner, in which, the expert opinion was obtained from the experts and submitted before this court", the bench added and posted to April 22, further hearing of the case.