CHANDIGARH: The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Tuesday granted stay on the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) order that had set aside the appointment of Punjab Director
General of Police Dinkar Gupta.
The petition challenging the CAT order was today taken up by a division bench of Justice Jaswant Singh and Justice Sant Prakash. The bench stayed the CTA order, this was confirmed by Puneet Bali the counsel of Gupta. The next date for the hearing has been fixed for February 26. The Bench directed Punjab Government to file an affidavit on material forwarded to the UPSC regarding each officer considered. The direction was in response to the argument that complete facts were not mentioned in the material sent to the commission.
It also directed the filing of an affidavit by the UPSC on restrictions regarding the number of officers considered. The direction followed the argument that all ADGPs with 30 years of experience were in consideration zone.
Punjab Advocate General Atul Nanda said that the arguments during the court proceedings went on for two hours.
The Punjab Government and also DGP Gupta on Monday had approached the high court, challenging the CAT order.
On Friday the CAT had set aside the appointment of Gupta as Punjab DGP. The two-member bench of Justice L. Narasimha Reddy who is the Chairman of CAT and Mohd. Jamshed who is Member Administrative in its order directed the Union Public Service Commission and the empanelment committee to form a new panel of three senior-most officers for appointment to the post of DGP and complete the exercise within four weeks.
Two separate petitions were filed in the CAT by two senior Punjab IPS officers, Mohammad Mustafa of 1985 batch and Siddarth Chattopadhyaya of 1986 batch in February last year, seeking quashing of the order of appointment of Gupta.
On February 7, last year the Punjab Government had appointed Gupta a 1987 batch IPS officer as the DGP who had superseded five senior officers based on the recommendations made by the Empanelment Committee constituted by the UPSC.