Supreme Court To Hear Plea Challenging Rakesh Asthana's Appointment As Delhi Police Commissioner On May 18

The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear on May 18 the petitions filed by the NGO Centre for Public Interest Litigation(CPIL) challenging the appointment of Rakesh Asthana as the Commissioner of Delhi Police.Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the petitioner, made a mention of the case before a bench led by Justice DY Chandrachud. He submitted that the case status shows the matter to be listed on May 18, shortly before the Court closes for summer vacation. He prayed that the matter be heard on that day itself, as the term of Asthana will expire on July. The matter was listed on April 27 but could not be taken up as Justice Chandrachud was not sitting on that day.Bhushan submitted that he will take maximum one and half hours to make his submissions.Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta submitted that the Union will take longer time to make submissions. The bench agreed to hear the matter on May 18 itself before the summer recess.Asthana, a 1984-batch Gujarat cadre IPS Officer, was appointed as Delhi Police Commissioner on July 27, four days before he was scheduled to retire from service. The Union Home Ministry, which oversees the Delhi Police, granted Mr Asthana one year's extension in service "in public interest".The plea moved through Advocate Prashant Bhushan avers that just four days before his retirement, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued the order of his appointment as Delhi Police Commissioner thereby extending his service initially for a period of one year beyond the date of his superannuation on 31.07.2021.The plea states that the appointment order is in clear and blatant breach of the directions passed by Apex Court in the Prakash Singh case (2006) 8 SCC 1 as:Asthana did not have a minimum residual tenure of six months; No UPSC panel was formed for the appointment of Delhi Police Commissioner; and The criteria of having a minimum tenure of two years had been ignored The petitioner argued that the decision is in violation of a July 2018 judgment of the Supreme Court in the case Prakash Singh & Others v.Union of India which said that the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) should, as far as possible, consider only those officers for such appointments who have two years of service left.The Delhi High Court, in its October 12 judgment dismissing the challenge against Asthana's appointment, held that the Prakash Singh guidelines are applicable only to states and have no application for appointment of Commissioners/Police Heads of Union Territories falling under the AGMUT Cadre.The High Court also held that Delhi being the national capital, the Central Government must be given larger leeway in appointing an experienced and competent officer as the Police Commissioner."It ought to be kept in mind that Delhi, being the Capital of India, has a unique, special and specific requirement. It has witnessed several untoward incidences and extremely challenging law and order situations/riots/crimes, which have an international implication, which in the wisdom of the Central Government necessitated appointment of an experienced officer possessing diverse and multifarious experience of heading a large Para-Military Security Force apart from other factors", the division bench comprising Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh observed.The High Court delivered the judgment in a writ petition filed by one person named Sadre Alam. Earlier, CPIL had approached the Supreme Court with its petition under Article 32. However, a bench led by the Chief Justice of India asked CPIL to approach the High Court, having regard to the pendency of the challenge there, and requested the High Court to decide the issue expeditiously.CPIL has filed a writ petition challenging Asthana's appointment and a special leave petition challenging the Delhi High Court's judgment upholding it.

Supreme Court To Hear Plea Challenging Rakesh Asthana's Appointment As Delhi Police Commissioner On May 18

Shruti Kakkar

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