Delhi Assembly panel's members recommend action against CS after skipping its meeting

In a move that may trigger another round of tussle between the AAP government and bureaucracy, members of a Delhi Assembly panel today recommended privilege proceedings for "contempt of House" against Chief Secretary Anshu Prakash after he skipped its meeting on alleged irregularities in a cooperative bank.
The members of the Question and Reference Committee, headed by Deputy Speaker Rakhi Birla, also recommended action against the office bearers of the IAS Officers' Association for asking the bureaucrats to "boycott the meetings called by House panel".
However, the IAS association said no officer was asked to boycott the meetings of the Delhi Assembly.

The associations of IAS, DANICS and DASS officers had yesterday passed a resolution, saying that officers would not attend meetings called by the AAP minister until Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal apologised.
Current Secretary-cum-Registrar of Department of Cooperative Society (RCS), J B Singh, and former RCS Shurbir Singh, who also skipped today's meeting, might also face the privilege proceedings.
"All members have recommended to chairperson Rakhi Birla to initiate privilege proceedings for contempt of House against Asnhu Prakash, J B Singh and Shurbir Singh for skipping meetings and also for IAS associations for asking officers to boycott the House proceedings. The chairperson of the panel said she will think over it." panel member Sourabh Bharadwaj told PTI.

Bharadwaj, who is also an AAP MLA, said the chief secretary had appeared before the House panel last week, but sought another date as Shurbir Singh and J B Singh were not present.

During the meeting of House panel, members were told that a message was conveyed to Prakash's office, but his staff said he was not well after attending a meeting at the PMO at 3 pm.
Last month, the Delhi Assembly's Petitions Committee had recommended "criminal proceedings" against two IAS officers for providing "help and aid to the corrupt" in connection with the alleged irregularities in Delhi Nagrik Sehkari Bank Ltd.

The panel had recommended that the chief secretary should submit an action taken report in the House within a month.
"The chief secretary should initiate criminal proceedings against Shurbir Singh and J B Singh for their acts of commission and omission to help and aid the corrupt," the committee had said in its report.