PM-headed panel likely to meet on Jan 24 to appoint new CBI Director: Sources

The high-powered Selection Committee headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to meet on January 24 to appoint the new CBI director succeeding Alok Verma whose ouster has triggered a major political row.

Besides Modi, Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi and the Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha Mallikarjun Kharge are other members of the panel.

Kharge had demanded that the panel meeting be convened at the earliest to appoint a new director of CBI as the agency cannot be run by an interim director, whose appointment he termed as illegal.

IPS officer M Nageswara Rao was named as the interim director of the CBI following Verma's removal.

The sources said the government had proposed the meeting on January 21 earlier while Kharge wanted the meeting on January 24 or 25.

After mutual consultations, the sources said, the government has finalised January 24 as the date for the meeting to select the new CBI Director, after Kharge is reported to have given his go-ahead for the date.

The post of CBI chief is lying vacant ever since Alok Verma was removed as CBI Director and appointed as Director General Fire Service in the meeting on January 10, in which Kharge gave his dissenting note.

Verma was removed within 48 hours of the Supreme Court reinstating him on the post.

Kharge had opposed the removal of Verma and instead demanded that he be compensated as the government removed him from the post for 77 days and thus be given an extension.

The Congress has been attacking the prime minister for not appointing a regular CBI Director. Kharge had also written to the prime minister demanding early holding of the meeting of the high powered committee to appoint a regular CBI Director.