Supreme Court Closes Contempt Proceedings Against MHA Secretary In Relation To Granting Reservation In Promotions

The Supreme Court on Tuesday closed the contempt proceedings against the Secretary of the Ministry of Home Affairs, Ajay Bhalla IAS, in relation to the implementation of reservation in promotion in central services.

A bench comprising Chief Justice of India UU Lalit and Justice S Ravindra Bhat closed the contempt proceedings at the request of Attorney General for India KK Venugopal, without expressing anything on the merits of the issue, which is left for future adjudication.

"Having heard the counsel for contempt petitioners and AG who has advanced submissions on behalf of contempt petitioners, we see not reason to entertain the contempt petition. The petition is disposed of. This shall not however be taken as reflection of merits of the matter which will be gone into in pending appeals", the bench noted in the order.

The contempt notice was issued against the Home Secretary in April 2021 by a Bench comprising Justices L. Nageswara Rao and Vineet Saran for allegedly violating the Apex Court's order of April 15, 2019. The Apex Court vide its April 15 order had directed for the maintenance of status quo in regards to the promotion of officers. However, the Department of Personnel and Training had on December 11, 2020 issued promotion orders in favour of 149 officers on an ad-hoc basis.

"The Government of India's problem is that there are three HC orders passed which say that promotions can continue to be made, while one HC has issued status quo orders on promotions. This opens up the Government for contempt.The issue is whether the promotions for regular appointments can be continued to be made, and whether it affects the reserved seats", the AG had submitted on an earlier occasion seeking recall of the contempt notice. The AG added that around 2500 posts had been lying vacant due to the status quo orders which are for regular promotions.

Today, the bench was considering the "Jarnail Singh" matter relating to the reservation in promotions. The bench adjourned the hearing after noting that a review petition has been filed against the judgment delivered in January this year which laid down the criteria for reservation in promotions. The bench said that it will post the review petition first for consideration and will hear the pending applications and connected appeals subsequently.