Oa No. 1340/2008. Case: Rakesh Bansal Vs 1 Union of India, Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs, New Delhi; 2. State of Jharkhand, Chief Secretary, Jharkhand; 3. Union of India, Secretary, Department of Personnel and Training, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, New Delhi. Central Administrative Tribunal
| Case Number | Oa No. 1340/2008 |
| Counsel | C. Harishankar, B. S. Jain |
| Judges | V. K. Bali (Chairman) & L. K. Joshi (Vice Chairman) |
| Issue | Indian Police Service (IPS) (Cadre) Rules, 1954 - rule 5, 8(1), 5(1); Indian Police Service (Probation) Rules, 1954 - rule 2 (ee), 10 |
| Judgement Date | March 05, 2009 |
| Court | Central Administrative Tribunal |
Judgment:
L. K. Joshi (Vice Chairman), (Principal Bench, New Delhi)
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Shri Rakesh Bansal, the Applicant in this OA was allotted to the Indian Police Service (IPS) on securing 106th rank in the Civil Service Examination (CSE), 2006. The Applicant joined the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy (hereinafter referred as Police Academy) on 10.12.2007. Out of the total 103 candidates who were allotted to IPS on the basis of CSE, 2006, only 96 candidates joined the Police Academy for training. Seven candidates who were allotted the IPS, did not join the service. The cadre allocation was done after the candidates had joined the Academy and the notification allocating cadres to the officers of CSE, 2006 was issued on 2.06.2008. The Applicant was allotted Jharkhand cadre by this order. He is dissatisfied with the notification of allocation of cadre and the aforesaid order has been challenged in this OA.
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It has been strenuously urged on behalf of the Applicant that the Respondents have made a mistake in the procedure followed for allotment of cadre because they have allotted the cadres only to the persons who have joined the training course for the IPS officers at the Academy (96 in this case) instead of making allotment of cadres to all the candidates who were allotted to IPS initially (103 in this case). It has made enormous difference in the allocation of cadres to the officers because seven officers at various points according to merit in the list of the officers allotted to IPS have not been considered for cadre allotment. An exercise has been carried by the Applicant as given in detail in the OA, to demonstrate that he would have been allotted to AGMUT cadre if all the 103 candidates had been considered for cadre allotment instead of 96, who eventually joined the Police Academy for training. It is urged that the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), the first Respondent herein, had been since 1985 following the policy of allocation of cadre to all those who had been allotted to IPS only for CSE, 2006, this departure has been made by which the exercise of allocation of cadre has been undertaken after the officers had joined the Police Academy for training. Not allotting cadres to officers who did not join the training has resulted in wrong allocation of cadres, as contended by the learned counsel for the Applicant.
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Strong reliance has been placed by the Applicant on the judgement of the Honourable Supreme Court in Union of India through Secretary and another Vs. Rahul Rasgotra and others, (1994) 2 SCC 600. It is contended that the Honourable Supreme Court has held that the steps leading to the selection and appointment of a candidate to an All India Service are (i) competitive examination; (ii) selection in the competition and determination of the candidate's order of merit; (iii) allocation of the particular All India Service to him or her based on the candidate's position in the order of merit; and (iv) allocation of the State Cadre to him. It is further contended that the Honourable Supreme Court has clearly held that there would be no reason to defer the cadre allotment till a candidate has joined the training after being allotted to a particular All India Service. The learned counsel would repeatedly emphasize that the allocation of cadre has to be done after the allotment of service and not after the candidates join the training at the Police Academy. In this context, reference has also been made to the detailed procedure followed in the allotment of cadres to the All India Service (Annex A-2), paragraph 4 of which reads thus:
4. A list of candidates allotted to the service is prepared indicating their home states and their willingness to be allocated to their home states and each candidate is assigned a Sl. No. in the order of merit in the said list.
According to the learned counsel for the Applicant, it clearly shows that the service has to be allocated immediately after candidates are allotted to the service and not after the candidates have joined at the Police Academy for training. The officer has to serve the allotted cadre almost for the entire period of his service. The wrong procedure by which the Applicant has been allocated to Jharkhand cadre instead of AGMUT cadre, serious prejudice has been caused to the Applicant.
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The learned counsel for the Applicant also takes exception to the averment of the Respondents in their counter affidavit that the procedure was changed because of this Tribunal's order in Rajesh Kumar Vs. Union of India, OA No.102/2007 decided on 2.01.2008. He would contend that the reliance on the aforesaid order is completely misplaced because the facts in the above mentioned OA are clearly distinguishable from the facts of the case in hand.
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The learned counsel for the Respondents has stoutly opposed the cause of the Applicant by filing counter affidavit. It is argued that the allotment of cadre is done under the Indian Police Service (IPS) (Cadre) Rules, 1954. Rule 5 of IPS (Cadre) Rules, 1954 reads thus:
"5. Allocation of members to various cadres. '5(1) The allocation of cadre officers to the various cadres shall be made by the Central Government in consultation with the State Government or the State Governments concerned.
5(2) The Central Government may, with the concurrence of the State Governments concerned, transfer a cadre officer from one cadre to another cadre".
It is urged, therefore, that the government has the absolute power to allocate cadre to the officers of IPS under the abovementioned Rules. The Respondents would also place strong reliance on Union of India and others Vs. Rajiv Yadav, IAS and others, 1994 SCC (L&S) 1265.
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The Respondents have also raised a preliminary objection that the Applicant has come before the Tribunal without exhausting all the remedies and without filing any representation before the Respondent. It is contended that the Applicant could have come before this Tribunal only after filing a representation before the Respondents for his grievance and after its decision by the Respondents, he could have challenged it before the Tribunal or if the decision had not been taken within a period of six months from the date of receipt of such representation, he could have still come before the Tribunal. Reliance in this regard is placed on a Full Bench decision of this Tribunal in B. Parameshwara Rao Vs. The Divisional Engineer Telecommunications, Elura, OA No.27/1990 decided on 10.04.1990.
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Before considering the arguments of the learned counsel for the parties, we may consider the judgement of the Honourable Supreme Court in Rahul Rasgotra (supra) because the Applicant's strong reliance on this. The facts of the case are that Rahul Rasgotra, respondent before the Honourable Supreme Court, was selected for the IPS following his success in CSE, 1988. Rahul Rasgotra thus belongs to 1989 batch of the IPS. At the time when Rahul Rasgotra was selected for the IPS, a provision existed in the Rules for granting exemption from joining training with other probationers of the batch for which a candidate had been selected, i.e., in case of Rahul Rasgotra, the probationers of 1989 batch of IPS. This provision existed in order to allow the candidate to appear in the CSE again to improve his prospects. Such probationers were known as 'exempted probationers' under the then existing Rule 2 (ee) of the Indian Police Service (Probation) Rules, 1954. Rule 2 (ee) defined 'exempted probationer' to mean a person 'who, on being allocated to the Service, had expressed his intention to appear at the next examination and had been permitted to abstain from probationary training in order to so appear. The Indian Police Service (Probation) Rules, 1954 define in Rule 2 (e) 'probationer to mean a person...
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