Shun gender-based appointment to Civil Supplies CID, observe judges

The first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice M Sundar while closing a suo-motu plea pertaining to gender discrimination in the appointment and promotion in the post of sub-inspector of police in the CS-CID, said “The mental process of excluding the women officers must be eschewed and we caution the officer not to approach posting with such an intent. Any action to the contrary will be viewed as a gender discrimination issue against the officer concerned.” 

The matter relates to the controversial decision of the DGP K Radhakrishnan to not allow deployment of women inspectors on field duty despite them being transferred to such posts, because they were not ‘suitable for the job.’ 

Taking serious note of it, the first bench initiated suo motu proceedings on November 21 and sought the DGP to file a counter. To make matters worse, the additional advocate-general, told the bench that women officers would be unable to ‘cover the entire jurisdiction of revenue districts and conduct raids at odd hours.’ 

However, the bench on perusing the counter affidavit filed by, DGP on Monday, which clarified that the GO dated October 19, 2005 does not refer to any debarment of women police officers from being posted in CS-CID, said  “The affidavit now seeks to set up a case as if there was unwillingness or non-meeting of the norms by the women police officers as the reason for issuance of the letter dated September 22, 2016 and states that the deponent has no personal reservation in taking women police inspectors.” 

The bench also held that “In the conspectus of the matter, we do believe that this appears to be really a re-think rather than a correct explanation for the letter dated September 22, 2016, which categorically stated, “As women inspectors have not been inducted into CSCID since its inception in 1964, the DGP, TN, Chennai has been requested to reconsider their postings to CSCID”.

The Madras High Court’s interim order banning registration of unauthorised layouts/ plots/ buildings across the State is all set to continue, with the Government seeking more time to frame rules to regulate conversion of farm lands into housing plots.

When the plea came up before the first bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice M Sundar on Monday, Advocate General sought two more weeks as the process of framing the rules has reached the final stages. The bench on raising a query as to whether the delay was political or administrative, posted the case for further hearing to January 30. 

However, the bench on rejecting the pleas moved by realtors and others seeking to register the land, observed that the whole endeavor was to untangle the mess created by indiscriminate conversion of farm lands into housing plots. 

Seeking the Chief Secretary to bestow attention on the issue, the bench said the conversion of agricultural lands for non-agricultural use in an unplanned manner ought to be undone. However, the bench on responding to advocates seeking to lift the ban and appoint a committee of retired judges to look into the issue, said we are against system of parallel committee and that once the regulations are framed it would be placed in public domain before finalising it.