Kerala HC directs CAT to consider maintainability of petitions filed by IAS officer

The Kerala High Court on Monday directed the Ernakulam Bench of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) to consider the maintainability of petitions filed by senior IAS officer B. Ashok, who had challenged the State government transferring him from the post of Principal Secretary, Agriculture, and the Agricultural Production Commissioner.

A Division Bench of Justice Nithin Jamdar and Justice Basant Balaji said the CAT had to at first decide on the issue of the Governor being arrayed as respondent in the case.

The court issued the directive while hearing petitions filed by the government that challenged the CAT’s interim orders passed earlier this month that aside Mr. Ashok’s inter-cadre transfer.

The government had transferred him from the posts and appointed him as CMD of the Kerala Transport Development Finance Corporation (KTDFC), and later as Chairperson of the Local Self-Government Reforms Commission on deputation. The CAT had stayed these government orders.

Challenging the stay, the State government contended before the High Court that transfers and postings were part of service and that IAS officers did not have lien over any post. The government further said Mr. Ashok’s pleas before the CAT were not legally maintainable, since he had ‘improperly impleaded’ the Governor as a respondent in a dispute relating to transfer.

Mr. Ashok’s counsel said the State had already raised this contention before the CAT, and that the Governor had indicated he had no objection to being impleaded in the petitions. On hearing both the parties, the court opined that the CAT must first decide on the maintainability of the petitions filed by Mr. Ashok and posted the case for hearing on September 29.

Apart from this matter, the court would also consider on the same day a petition filed by the government challenging an interim order of the CAT that mandated the recommendation of the Civil Services Board (CSB) for transferring IAS officers.

In its plea before the CAT on Monday, the government filed a preliminary objection, stating that the impleading of the Governor as a respondent was constitutionally impermissible and unsustainable in law.

The Supreme Court too had repeatedly affirmed this, and that he cannot be personally answerable in court proceedings. In the present case, the State government was the proper party, it said. The arguments before the CAT on the matter would continue on Tuesday.