Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, May 25: The Gujarat cadre IPS officer Rakesh Asthana is learnt to have lost the race for the directorship of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the post for which he was considered the firm favourite, because of a hitherto unused rule cited by the chief justice of India N V Ramana.
During the meeting of the three-member panel for the selection of the CBI chief held at the residence of the prime minister Narendra Modi on Monday evening, CJI was learnt to have raised the “six-month rule” that eliminated two senior IPS officers for the post, both believed to had been in the first two spots of Modi’s choices.
The third member of the panel, the leader of the largest opposition party in the Lok Sabha, Congress, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, did not object to the names but had reportedly expressed strong reservations about the “system” followed in picking the names for selection of the CBI chief.
Official sources said Ramana during the discussions raised the “six-month rule” issue which has never been cited before in the selection of a CBI director but was referred to in a Supreme Court judgement. Referring to the judgement, the CJI pointed out that anyone in the panel if had less than six months of service left before retirement should not the considered for the CBI director’s post.
He insisted that the selection panel must comply with the law. Chowdhury reportedly also backed the rule which had to be accepted by the selection committee because of the two-to-one majority support. This automatically disqualified Asthana, a former joint CBI director and currently the chief of the Border Security Force, who is scheduled to retire on July 31, as well as the National Investigating Agency (NIA) chief Y C Modi who has only a few days to go before retiring on May 31. Asthana and Modi were said to be the first two names in the government’s panel for the post.
Unfortunately for Asthana the panel meeting was delayed by more than four months due to the prevailing Covid conditions in the state. He would not have missed the bus on the six-month rule if the meeting was held before the CBI director’s post fell vacant some four months ago and once appointed, extensions in service remain in the domain of the government.
After the 90-minute meeting, the high-powered selection panel zeroed in on three names – former Maharashtra Director General Of Police Subodh Kumar Jaiswal, Director General of Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) KR Chandra and Home Ministry Special Secretary VSK Kaumudi. Subodh Kumar Jaiswal being the senior most in the three-member panel is considered to be the frontrunner.
Chowdhury had no objection to the names but put up a dissent note alleging that the government had followed a “casual approach” in listing candidates. He said he had originally received 109 names, which were paired down to 16 names on Monday just before the panel met and further pruned down to six names when the meeting started.
The way the procedure was followed, it was in conflict of the mandate of the committee. On May 11, I was given 109 names… and today by 1 pm, 10 names were shortlisted while by 4 pm, six names were shortlisted. This casual approach of the department of personnel and training is highly objectionable,” the Congress leader said.
For the present CBI director’s post, Indian Police Service (IPS) officers from four senior-most batches (1984-87) were considered. The law says the committee will select the CBI director “on the basis of seniority, integrity and experience in the investigation of anti-corruption cases” from a list of IPS officers drawn from the four senior-most batches. The post is lying vacant since February.