Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Monday questioned chief secretary Somesh Kumar as to why he had not made PK Mohanty, the chief secretary at the time of re-organisation of erstwhile AP, a respondent in the petition challenging the allocation of All India Service cadre done by the central department of personnel and training (DoPT).
The court referred to the personal allegations made by Somesh Kumar against PK Mohanty that he played a malicious role with a view to bringing his daughter and son-in-law into the Telangana state during the All India Service cadre allocations, and because of this, his (Somesh) allocation was made to Andhra Pradesh.
It was in this connection that the division bench of the high court comprising Justice Ujjal Bhuyan and Justice Surepalli Nanda asked Somesh Kumar why he hasn't made PK Mohanty a respondent in the petition filed against his allocation to AP cadre.
The bench was hearing the batch of petitions filed by the Union Ministry of DoPT, which challenged the orders of the Central Administrative Tribunal ( CAT)’s Hyderabad bench that allowed the pleas of several IAS and IPS officers that they be allowed to work in the state of their choice (after bifurcation), by setting aside the cadre allocation done by the Union Government.
In the batch of petitions, the bench has been hearing the issue of Somesh Kumar’s allocation to Telangana by the CAT, whereas originally he had been allocated to Andhra Pradesh.
DV Seetharama Murthy, senior counsel appearing for Somesh, argued that the Union Government had violated the IAS cadre service rules, seniority rules etc during the cadre allocation. He submitted that on the day of appointment, as per the AP Reorganization Act, there were only 294 AIS officers working here, and out of them 191 were direct recruits and 103 were promoted to the cadre.
But, the allocation was done by the Union Government in violation of the seniority rules, by resorting to the option of the available officers in the batch-wise slot, the senior counsel argued.
Refuting the contention that PK Mohanty was not working on 1 June 2014 and that he was retired on that day, a day before the appointment, Somesh Kumar claimed that several GOs had been issued by the government in the name of PK Mohanty on 1 June 2014.
“This itself buttresses the fact that he was in service. So, the contention of the Union Government is wrong, that PK Mohanty was already retired,” counsel argued.
He also said Mohanty`s son and daughter-in-law were in All India Services in erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, but they were in outsiders cadre and did not belong to AP cadre. “Both outsiders were being allotted to Telangana state cadre due to the malice role played by PK Mohanty, who was a member in the Pratyush Sinha panel. It resulted in a cascading effect on whole cadre allocation,” Seetarama Murthy argued on behalf of Somesh.
Further, it was argued, “In the lottery (system), roaster was to be allotted to Telangana firstly. But, contrary to that, at the time of allocation, roaster was allotted to Andhra Pradesh, the reasons best known to them. It is a clear violation. How could the Union Government say that it had followed the guidelines and rules of cadre allotment? Moreover, the concept of lottery itself was contrary to cadre allocation. Cadre could be easily allocated on the basis of the seniority list by following the rules. This is not rocket science. But, the department changed its stand from time to time in cadre allocation,” Somesh’s counsel argued. The arguments will continue on 7 April.
