BENGALURU: A recent Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) order came as a relief to three IAS officers, as it will enable them to claim seniority and promotion one year earlier than what the government has fixed. CAT ordered that two of them are entitled to get allotments from 2001 instead of 2002 and for the third IAS officer, 2000 can be considered the year of allotments instead of 2001.
The division bench of Dr K B Suresh and P K Pradhan ordered that this should be done within three months. The three IAS officers are V Srirama Reddy, Managing Director, Karnataka State Small Scale Industries Development Corporation, (he retired a few months back) V Shankar, Deputy Commissioner, Bengaluru Urban and F R Jamadar, Deputy Commissioner, Ramanagara.
CAT referred to discrimination by the state government in the allotment year assigned by saying, “It shows Shantharaj, who has 24 years of service, has been given a weightage of eight years and allowed the year of 1999 on the basis of the select list of 2007. Therefore, on the basis of the select list of 2009, the applicants should be placed in an appropriate timeframe.”
While sending the proposal to the Union Government for promotion to state-cadre officers, the state government assigned 2002 as year of allotment for V Srirama Reddy and V Shankar and 2001 for Jamadar. So the officers were promoted to IAS from KAS on December 14, 2011. Therefore, they lost a year’s seniority and monetary benefits.
The three IAS officers had approached CAT against the state and union governments.
On a similar ground, another IAS officer M Manjunath Naik, Deputy Commissioner Haveri, has also approached CAT, but the case is yet to be decided.
The IAS officers contended that the action of the state and union government was arbitrary. When they submitted a representation to the state to rectify the mistake, it was not considered. “The action of the state government is against the Article 14 of the Constitution of India,” they said.
What The Rules Say
According to Rule 3(3)(ii) of the Indian Administrative Services (Regulation of Seniority) Rules, 1987, an applicant, who was a State Civil Services Officer and has completed 25 years of service, is entitled to a weightage of nine years and year of allotment is 2000 instead of 2001. The above Rules also make it clear that one year’s weightage shall be given for every year completed in the State Civil Services.