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High court cancels CAT order on Subramaniam's extension

In a significant ruling, the Delhi high court on Saturday quashed the Central Administrative Tribunal's order cancelling the extension granted to T S R Subramaniam as Cabinet secretary.

The court order allows the bureaucrat to continue in office till February 4.

Admitting the central government's appeal, a two-judge vacation bench comprising Justices Vijender Jain and S K Mahajan dismissed the CAT order observing that ''prima facie the tribunal had no jurisdiction to entertain an application filed by anybody other than the aggrieved person.''

The high court said that as per the law, no third party or a public interest petition could be entertained to stay an appointment made by the government.

''The persons aggrieved are not here in this case. Hence the CAT order is being quashed,'' the bench ruled.

The court issued show cause notices to the CAT, Dr K S Chauhan, Baldev Singh Kataria, the office bearer of the National Building Construction Corporation Workers and Employees Association, Jaswant Singh, general secretary of the P&T SC/ST Employees Welfare Association (the PIL was filed by the three), and three others.

The parties have been asked to reply to the notices by February 4, when the case will come up for hearing again.

The bench gave the judgement after hearing the arguments of Attorney General Ashok Desai, Constitutional expert Soli Sorabjee and advocate Rajiv K Garg (who appeared for the CAT) and senior counsel V P Singh (who appeared for Dr Chauhan).

The proceedings which started at around 1315 hours at Justice Jain's residence continued till 1500 hours.

Desai and Sorabjee argued that there was no locus standi in Dr Chauhan's application as he was not an aggrieved party of the government's decision.

The two-member CAT bench, while setting aside the three-month extension and declaring the post vacant had observed, ''We are of the firm opinion that the extension of the services given in the present case to Subramaniam cannot stand the test of legality.''

However, it had allowed the government to appoint him on his own merit on the basis of a fresh contract, or reemploy him on appropriate terms and conditions.

Dr Chauhan had moved the petition under section 19 of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985.

The petitioner had sought relief from the Tribunal saying it had the jurisdiction to entertain such applications as the extension of service to Subramaniam after the age of superannuation was a service matter under section 3 (q) of the Act.

He alleged that Subramaniam, by procuring two extensions, had stalled the appointment of a successor. (The cabinet secretary was to retire on December 31, 1996.) This deprived other eligible candidates from holding the post, he said.

The CAT order said the central government counsel had not objected to the jurisdiction of the Tribunal for entertaining this petition.

The attorney general and Sorabje argued that the Tribunal had grievously erred in holding that the extension was illegal. The ruling was totally against the rules. They said the Tribunal placed extensive reliance on guidelines which were not pleaded nor placed before it. Apparently, the guidelines were the result of the Tribunal's research. But the petitioners were not given any opportunity for researching the subject.

Desai argued the Tribunal failed to appreciate that the vacancy of cabinet secretary arose because of the ex-parte interim order of the Tribunal, and not because Subramaniam stood superannuated on December 31. In fact, before December 31, his services were extended till March 31, 1998.

Dr Chauhan said he would challenge the order before the Supreme Court.

UNI

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