Hassan: She refused to buckle under alleged political pressure that saw her shunted out as Deputy Commissioner of Hassan in the Siddaramaiah government merely six months after taking charge and now Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, Rohini Sindhuri, is back in her old post after a hard won battle before the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) and the high court.
On Monday the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms issued an order reinstating Ms Sindhuri as Hassan DC and transferring the incumbent officer, PC Jaffer to make way for her.
The officer made news when she took on the Siddaramaiah government over her transfer from Hassan on January 22 this year, merely six months after she took charge in July, 2017. It was alleged at the time that the then district in-charge Minister, A. Manju was responsible as he was unhappy with her style of functioning, and especially with her choice of company for the scaffolding work for the Bahubali statue at Shravanabelagola during the Mahamastakabhisheka in February.
Although Ms Sindhuri was transferred as Managing Director of the Industries and Infrastructure Development Corporation in Bengaluru, she refused to take charge and fortunately for her, the Election Commission of India (ECI) stayed her transfer saying it would hamper the revision of electoral rolls as the DC was also the District Election Officer (DEO) for the Assembly poll.
Later, the state government on March 5 withdrew its order transferring her and other officers. But two days later, without any warning, it transferred her once again on March 7 and replaced her with Mysuru DC, Randeep.
Angered by this fresh transfer order, Ms Sindhuri approached the Central Administrative Tribunal on March 8 and on March 21 was asked to approach the state government in the matter. But she instead chose to move the high court, which referred her petition back to CAT. When on April 17, CAT dismissed her petition and upheld the order of the state government, she once again knocked on the doors of the court and this time things went in her favour, leading to her reinstatement by the Kumaraswamy government.
