DoPT rejects demand saying it would impinge on states’ powers

NEW DELHI: Minister of Personnel V Narayanasamy has rejected the demand of civil services associations that the power to suspend an officer should be with the Centre and not states. He said this would amount to impinging on states’ domain.

Speaking to ET, Narayanasamy said it was the state’s right to take disciplinary action against an All-India services officer when they work for state governments. “We have to go by the rules and cannot interfere with the state’s domain. Other demands made by three civil services associations are being looked into,” Narayanasamy said, referring to the All India Services (Discipline and Appeal) Rules that bestow the right to suspend an officer to the states.

The minister clarified that UP IAS officer Durga Shakti Nagpal had not approached the Centre over her suspension.

Irked over unjustified suspensions of civil servants by state governments and notably in the case of Nagpal, representatives of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Police Service (IPS) and Indian Forest Service (IFoS) associations had met the Secretary of the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) SK Sarkar on Monday, demanding changes in rules of suspension to check any such abuse of power by states.

They also unanimously decided and demanded that powers of suspending an officer be taken back from states and be delegated to the Centre.

“The delegated powers to states are being misused rather abused. That is why the rules should be revisited and necessary amendments made. These are powers of the central government which were given to the states. We want it to be restored to the central government,” Sanjay R Bhoos Reddy, Secretary of IAS officers’ association had said on Monday.

A senior DoPT official told ET on Wednesday that states ultimately need the Centre’s approval to extend a suspension of an Indian Administrative Service officer beyond 90 days pending disciplinary proceedings and that was a safeguard built into the existing rules to avoid victimisation of an officer.