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The Delhi High Court today issued notice in plea challenging the appointment of Rakesh Asthana as Commissioner of Police, Delhi.

The division bench of Chief Justice DN Patel and Justice Jyoti Singh also allowed the intervention application of Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL) alleging that the main petition is a copy paste of CPIL’s plea in the Supreme Court.

The Court has listed the matter for next hearing on September 8.

During the course of hearing today Advocate Prashant Bhushan appearing for CPIL submitted that the Petition filed by Sadre Alam is a complete copy paste of CPIL’s petition. His prayer is also a copy paste of CPIL’s petition.

“Its a total mala fide petition. He is referring the Supreme Court as the High Court because he has copied everything from our petition”.

Bhushan urged the Court to take strict actions against Sadre Alam for violating the rules framed by the High Court

SGI Tushar Mehta appearing for Centre said he had no objection in allowing Bhushan’s intervention application and also urged the Court to prevent Alam from following the “footsteps of Bhushan”.

SGI Mehta  said “It appears that Mr Alam has copied and followed the steps of Mr Bhushan and he should be stopped. He seems to have copied Mr Bhushan which is very dangerous path and your lordship must prevent him for his own good.”

“Mr Bhushan’s application must be admitted and Mr Alam must be answerable to this Court. However both of them have no interest in this petition. Let this debutant be held with harsh hands. This is not jantar mantar or Ramleela where anybody can come. Somebody who has lost the race may come but what is the source of this PIL. Mr Bhushan must be impleaded and transposed as the the main petitioner and I have no objection on it. These are intermeddlers and there is a law against such intermeddlers”, Mehta submitted.

CPIL in its intervention application has alleged that  the petition filed by the Petitioner is a mindless “copy-paste” of the CPIL’s writ petition. Further “the entire writ petition, including the synopsis, list of dates, body of the writ, Grounds and the Prayers, is word-to-word identical to the CPIL’s writ petition. The Petitioner herein was in such a desperate hurry to file and get this writ petition heard by this Hon’ble Court before the CPIL’s writ petition could be taken up for hearing by the Hon’ble Supreme Court that the Petitioner totally failed to apply his mind at all while “copy-pasting” the CPIL’s writ petition. “

The petition filed by one Sadre Alam seeks quashing of the order/communication dated Jul 27 of the Appointment Committee of the Cabinet (ACC) granting inter-cadre deputation and extension of service to Asthana.

The petition filed through Adv. BS Bagga says that the impugned orders are in clear and blatant breach of the directions passed by the Supreme Court of India in Prakash Singh case as Asthana did not have a minimum residual tenure of six months at the time of his appointment as Commissioner of Police since he was to retire within 4 days. 

Further no Union Public Services Commission (UPSC) panel was formed for the appointment of the Delhi Police Commissioner and the criteria of having a minimum tenure of two years has been ignored.

The petitioner has submitted that “the post of Commissioner of Police in Delhi is akin to the post ofDGP of a State and he is the Head of Police Force for the NCT of Delhi and therefore, the directions concerning the appointment to the post of DGP passed by the Hon'ble Supreme Court of India in Prakash Singh case (supra) had to be followed by the Central Government while making the impugned appointment. However, the same have been given a complete go-by the Central Government”.

The petition thus seeks a direction to the Union Government to initiate fresh steps for appointing the Commissioner of Police, Delhi, strictly in accordance with the directions issued by the  Supreme Court of India in the Prakash Singh case viz., (2006) 8 SCC 1,(2019) 4 SCC 13and (2019) 4 SCC 1 of an officer of the Arunachal Pradesh-Goa-Mizoram and Union Territory (AGMUT) cadre.

Case Title: Sadre Alam vs UOI