Retirement order of 10 judges set aside
The High Court on Tuesday set aside the compulsory retirement orders of 10 Civil Court judges and directed their reinstatement with consequential service benefits.
Hearing a petition filed by the 10 judges, Justice Anand Byrareddy set aside the order of their compulsory retirement that was passed following a recommendation by former Chief Justice P D Dinakaran.
On June 23, 2009, the State government following the recommendation by the then Chief Justice P D Dinakaran had ordered compulsory retirement of 15 judges on the grounds that they were “unfit” for several reasons including low rate of disposal of cases, their conduct with lawyers and since there were complaints against them.
Writ petitions
Subsequently, 13 judges out of the 15 filed writ petitions challenging the order, stating that “the grounds were false, no proper explanation was given and that procedure under Rule 285 of Karnataka Civil Service Rules (KCSR) had not been followed.”
Agreeing with the reasons stated by the petitioners, the court observed that the judges “had been unceremoniously sent home without proper interpretation of Rule 285 of KCSR” and set aside the order.
3 more pleas pending
The 10 judges whose retirement orders HC set aside are B Rudramuni, T Nagappa, Babuji T Chenal, M Tonne, Shivanand Dange, Anwar Ansari, Javed Pasha, Ullas Balekundri, N G Birader and Lakshmikanth Desi.
The remaining three petitions are yet to be heard.
CAT stays cops’ transfer
The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) on Tuesday has stayed the transfer of four police officials following a petition challenging their untimely transfer.
Hearing a petition by Davangere SP Venkatesh H S challenging his transfer order dated January 1, 2012, the Central Administrative Tribunal Bench stayed the transfer. Citing a Supreme Court judgement, the petitioner termed the transfer as “untimely and a violation of Supreme Court judgement”.
Venkatesh, who was transferred to Davangere on August 31, 2010, in his petition said there was no complaint against him and the transfer was not justified as it was in the middle of the academic year.
The CAT has also stayed the transfer of three other officers Laburam, Eshwar Chandra Vidyasagar and Abhishek Goyal.
