Kochi, The CAT on Friday held that the posts of Excise Commissioner, Director of KILA and Director General of IMG in Kerala are IAS cadre posts and cannot be filled by non-IAS officers.
The Ernakulam bench, comprising judicial member Justice Sunil Thomas and administrative member V Rama Mathew, said the cadre posts can only be filled and retained by IAS officers and if any of them are held by non-IAS officers or retired IAS officers, “they shall be removed immediately and the posts shall remain vacant”.
The Central Administrative Tribunal’s ruling will have an impact on the current position of senior IPS official, Mr. Ajithkumar, as Commissioner of Taxes.
The court also ruled that all appointments, transfer and posting of IAS officers in Kerala, whether on expiration of their term of service or not, shall be made in consultation with the Civil Service Board and in accordance with the procedure envisaged under the relevant provisions of the IAS Rules, 2014 and the Schedule thereto.
It directed that the posts notified as cadre posts by the Union Government should be filled only by IAS officers.
“The posts of Excise Commissioner, Director, Kerala Institute of Local Administration and Director General, Institute of Management in the government have been declared as IAS posts,” the CAT bench said.
It further said that “if any of the aforesaid posts are occupied by non-IAS officers or retired IAS officers, they shall be removed immediately and the posts shall remain vacant.”
In such circumstances, the government must make alternative arrangements to hold those positions, the court ordered, making it clear that the decisions taken by these officials so far will be preserved.
The court also declared that filling up of any IAS cadre post by non-IAS officers or retired IAS officers, by reappointment, renaming or in any other manner whatsoever and keeping the IAS cadre post vacant is “irregular and is a color exercise of executive functions”.
“There shall be a direction to the state government to submit quarterly reports on a regular basis as prescribed under the IAS rules and a corresponding duty on the Union government to ensure that such reports are duly submitted in the prescribed format,” the bench said in its 112-page order.
The CAT order came on the basis of a petition by the Kerala IAS Association and two of its members who alleged violation of the IAS Rules, 1954 and the IAS Amendment Rules, 2014, as well as unclassified transfers and appointments of IAS officers, and filling of cadre posts with non-IAS officers.
The association and its members also alleged that repeated transfers of IAS officers have taken place in Kerala without the recommendation of the CSB.
They also alleged that though there were sufficient number of IAS officers in the Kerala cadre to be appointed to cadre posts, some of these posts were being filled by non-IAS members or retired IAS officers, without recommendation of the CSB or any justifiable public interest and “for purely political considerations”.
The association and its members also claimed that the state deliberately dismantled the Civil Service Commission after its first two meetings in 2014 and 2015, and it was not held after that.
The state government denied the allegations and told the court that no non-IAS officers or retired IAS officers were posted to the notified posts of IAS officers, the CSB was not disbanded and there was no random transfer or posting of IAS officers.
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