The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Tuesday constituted a full court to hear cases of over 100 bureaucrats whose promotions to grades 20 and 21 were declared illegal last month.
IHC Chief Justice (CJ) Iqbal Hameedur Rehman constituted a full court bench to hear all the petitions relating to the bureaucrats’ promotion to be taken up on December 17. The bench will be headed by Rehman and will have Justice Muhammad Anwar Khan Kasi and Justice Riaz Ahmed Khan as its members.
CJ Rehman was hearing a petition filed against bureaucrats promoted in the past few years.
On November 14, Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui had declared the promotions illegal in an order passed in response to a petition filed by 50 civil servants from various occupational groups in March. The petitioners, while challenging the Central Selection Board’s decision, had maintained that they had been superseded by junior civil servants. They said they were ignored despite having careers spanning 33 years and spotless annual confidential reports.
The court had observed in its judgment that all the board meetings held in this regard were illegal and hence of no consequence. It had also stated that the civil servants who had earned their promotion without superseding others would continue to work at their current posts.
Justice Siddiqui had not signed the detailed order by the time his term expired on November 20. Meanwhile, some of the bureaucrats filed fresh petitions, while others filed intra-court appeals challenging the order of Justice Siddiqui, said a court official.
Deputy Attorney General Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri told The Express Tribune there were two separate decisions of single benches. Justice Siddiqui passed the order against the bureaucrats by declaring their promotions illegal, while another single bench had admitted some of the petitions. “Now the chief justice has constituted a full court bench to hear all the cases,” he added.
The Establishment Division’s Central Selection Board has since 2005 allocated 85 marks out of 100 to Annual Confidential Reports (ACRs) and Performance Evaluation Reports (PERs) while 15 discretionary marks are awarded by board members, which has generated controversy. Previously, the promotions were decided completely on the basis of the officer’s ACRs and PERs.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 12th, 2012.
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