ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday set aside recommendations of the Central Selection Board (CSB) to supersede and defer the promotion of 56 senior bureaucrats.

Justice Aamer Farooq while accepting petitions of the bureaucrats also directed the Establishment Division to maintain backdated seniority of the officers.

Besides claiming discrimination, the officers deprived of promotions in grade 20 and 21 had also challenged a memorandum evolved by the Establishment Division just before convening of the CSB.

IHC also directs Establishment Division to maintain backdated seniority of officers

According to the memorandum issued on June 18, 2017, just a day before the CSB was to meet for reconsidering promotion cases from May 2015, mandatory five marks were removed from the ‘objective assessment’ form. The Establishment Division removed the five marks from the integrity related column but linked the evaluation of personal profile, behaviour, discipline, integrity and reputation with documentary evidence.

This means the CSB could take into consideration material other than what is in the dossier or documentary evidence before them. The word ‘documentary evidence’ gave the CSB members space to assess an officer on the basis of Intelligence Bureau (IB) reports.

The Establishment Division introduced the controversial criterion in October 2014 under which the CSB was empowered to reject the promotion of a civil servant if they failed to secure at least three out of the five marks for ‘integrity/general reputation/perception.’

The CSB denied promotions to scores of senior bureaucrats on the basis of this criterion by invoking the integrity-related clause. The October 2014 promotions formula affected bureaucrats from the 13th and 14th common as a number of grade 20 officers from these batches were denied promotion in 2015.

These officers initially challenged the CSB’s recommendations in the IHC which set the promotions aside. Later, the Supreme Court upheld the IHC’s order and remanded the case back to the Establishment Division to reconsider the promotions.

Subsequently, the CSB denied promotion to scores of bureaucrats for one reason or another. As a result, the senior officers of 13th and 14th common and subsequent batches were superseded while their juniors in 15th, 16th and 17th common got promotion in grade 22.

In the detailed order, Justice Farooq of the IHC noted that the CSB did not apply its authority reasonably. Though the board tried to make its recommendations in conformity with the guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court, “the use of discretion while awarding 15 marks and giving the same overriding effect despite the fact that a person achieved the threshold is in violation of the pronouncement of the Supreme Court.”

Published in Dawn, September 28th, 2018