Nishka Srinivas Veluvali
Published On: January 06, 2022 at 19:22 IST
The Supreme Court has dismissed the Calcutta High Court Order which had formerly quashed the Verdict of Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) in which Alapan Bandyopadhyay had sought transfer of Case from Kolkata to New Delhi.
The Bench of Justice AM Khanwilkar and CT Ravikumar considered the Petition filed by the Centre questioning Calcutta High Court’s Order to overrule the Order of the CAT Principal Bench.
The Apex Court had stated that the Calcutta High Court had no Jurisdiction to give the Orders on the Plea of the former West Bengal (WB) Chief Secretary.
The Bench has also granted Bandyopadhyay to proceed to the Delhi High Court which holds the Jurisdiction to challenge the CAT Principal Bench Order.
The Central Government had approached the Supreme Court questioning the Calcutta high Court Order dated October 29 which quashed the CAT Principal Bench Verdict of endorsing the transfer of the Case from Bengal to New Delhi.
The Centre had stated that the High Court (Calcutta) had no Jurisdiction to intervene in the Case as the action had taken place in Delhi primarily and thus the Principal Bench has complete Jurisdiction as the Chargesheet was issued from here.
Furthermore, if the former Chief Secretary desires to challenge the CAT Principal Bench’s Order then it should be carried forward in Delhi High Court and not Calcutta High Court.
In May 2021, when Bandyopadhyay was serving Chief Secretary of West Bengal, the Centre had asked him to reduce his tenure and report to New Delhi.
On 31st of same month, Bandyopadhyay was retired following which an inquiry was commenced against him by the Centre for not being present in the meeting being chaired by the Prime Minister on 28 May, 2021 for analysing the losses incurred due to the storm YAAS.
Bandyopadhyay had advanced to the CAT Kolkata Bench challenging the Inquiry Order following which the Centre too approached the Principal Bench for the transfer of case to Delhi.
On October 22, the Principal Bench had permitted to the transfer of the Case from Bengal to Delhi.
Challenging this Order, Bandyopadhyay approached the Calcutta High Court which had quashed the Principal Bench’s Order after which the Centre moved to the Supreme Court.