After three directives by the court, sixteen months of struggle, IFS officer Sanjeev Chaturvedi's inter cadre deputation request to the Delhi government has been declined by the Appointments Committee of Cabinet.

COMMERCIAL BREAK
SCROLL TO CONTINUE READING

In an order dated June 21, the ACC rejected Chaturvedi's request to transfer from the Uttarakhand cadre to the government of the National Capital Territory of Delhi. Chaturvedi had been fighting to get his cadre changed for months and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal even wrote to the Ministry of Environment Forests and Climate Change in 2015 requesting Chaturvedi. 

The ACC has rejected the inter cadre deputation on the basis of mandatory three-year cooling-off period that, it says, Chaturvedi has to fulfil on completion of his central deputation at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, which ends on June 28. The order also says that the Uttarakhand government had not granted Chaturvedi the No-Objection Certificate (NOC) he needed for the deputation. Interestingly, the order adds that the state government had said it would have no objection if the Centre waived off the cooling period. Neither of which has happened. 

The curious part of the ACC order is that it comes on the heels of a highly exasperated order by the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), dated June 2, that had pulled up the ACC for keeping the matter pending deposited three reminders. It had directed the committee to decide on the deputation within two weeks so as to not cause "irreparable loss" for the applicant, Chaturvedi. The Tribunal had previously issued orders on April 27 and on November 5, 2015. The order against Chaturvedi comes after many reminders and a slap on the wrist. 

Chaturvedi, who won the Magsaysay award in 2015 has had many run-ins with the government. The Centre declined the donation of his award winnings to AIIMS and also held up his previous inter-cadre deputation from the Government of Haryana to the Government of Uttarakahand, which was finally pushed through "on grounds of extreme hardship". A career whistleblower, he had unearthed many scams during his Haryana tenure, getting him in trouble with the state government.