Guj HC stays exam for promotions in SRP

The Gujarat High Court today stayed holding of departmental examinations for promotions to the rank of platoon commander in State Reserve Police (SRP), scheduled to begin from June 26, until a petition challenging the reservation policy in promotion is disposed of.
A division bench of Chief Justice R Subhash Reddy and Justice V M Pancholi, while hearing the case today, said "any step in that direction will be subject to the disposal of the petition".
The petitioner, Dadubhai Chavda, an armed head constable with SRP, had sought interim relief by seeking not to proceed with the examination while seeking change in the reservation rule being followed in the promotion of SRP personnel.

He had sought change in roster register, which is the register of the seniority of police personnel made after taking into account the category, to which each policeman or woman belongs, claiming that the register "is erroneous since it does not follow the law laid down in this regard."
Chavda said in his petition that candidates from Scheduled Tribe (ST) category "erroneously" become eligible to appear for examination for promotions to the rank of platoon commander or police sub inspector, for which the basic criterion is to work as armed ASI for a minimum of two years.
"Irregular promotion of ST candidates has been to the disadvantage of police personnel of other categories, and their opportunity for an early promotion to the rank of armed ASI is prejudiced," the petitioner said.

"A candidate belonging to reserved category, even though junior to a candidate of the general category, gets faster promotions even to the rank of armed ASI.

"This accelerated promotion has cascading effect when it comes to appearing to promotion examinations for platoon commanders as it requires an experience of two years in their rank of armed ASI, as per rules brought forward by a notification dated May 2013.
"Many candidates belonging to ST category, who should not have been promoted in the first place to the rank of armed ASIs, are eligible to appear at the said promotion examination.
"Deserving candidates who are still armed head constable like present petitioner do not meet the eligibility criterion due to an erroneous operation of the roaster register," the petitioner said.