HC seeks report on 'illegal appointments' in Himachal

Himachal Pradesh High Court today directed the state government to furnish details of probe into the alleged illegal recruitments made by state government from 1993 to February 1998, and also asked what prevented the government from cancelling the illegal appointments.
A division bench, consisting Chief Justice A M Khanwilkar and Justice Kuldip Singh, directed the investigating officer in the case to remain present in court with the relevant record on next date of hearing on July 1.
The order was passed on a petition of former Himachal Pradesh Subordinate Services Selection Board chairman S M Katwal.
The bench, which also asked the state government to keep ready the chart indicating the nature of investigation done, particularly from November 2005 for perusal of the court, said "we fail to understand as to what prevented the government to cancel illegal appointments or to take action against the persons who were instrumental in making such appointments."

"The irregularities and illegalities in regard to the recruitment/appointments were disclosed in the reports of two committees headed by Harsh Gupta and Avay Shukla were serious in nature having far reaching effects, the government ought to have taken an immediate action so as to bring culprits to task," the court observed.
"In our considered view, since the reports of the two committees revealed commission of cognizable offences, it requires to be thoroughly probed. We, therefore, direct the Vigilance department to register a case and probe the scam thoroughly to identify persons who had been instrumental or at whose instance the appointments were made. The investigation shall be entrusted to an officer not less than the rank of S P, the bench said in its order.

The petitioner had alleged that despite registration of a first information report on the High Court's directions on November 11, 2005, no investigation was being done in the case after the court stopped monitoring it after the writ was disposed off on May 22, 2008.