The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Tuesday ordered the promotion of senior bureaucrats in light of the recommendations of the Central Selection Board (CSB).
The court also suspended Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s order to review the decision regarding the promotions.
Announcing the decision on a petition filed by senior bureaucrats, Islamabad High Court Chief Justice Muhammad Anwar Khan Kasi ordered promotions for bureaucrats in the light of CSB recommendations.
In February 2014 the CSB had recommended promotions for 44 Pakistan Administrative Service (PAS) officers, 11 Police Service of Pakistan (PSP) officers and 12 Foreign Service Group (FSG) officers.
The PM then ordered a review of the promotions given to 18 PAS officers, five PSP officers, and four FSG officers. After the PM’s order, their promotions were withheld.
The officers then challenged the decision in the IHC.
The decision was challenged by 11 petitioners, who in their petition contended that CSB was a constituted to consider whether or not an officer was fit for promotion.
The petitioners had argued that under an apex court judgement in Orya Maqbool Abbasi versus Federation of Pakistan, the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP) had stated that the CSB, as a semi-judicial forum, had been authorised to examine the cases of the officers justly and fairly. “If this is the case, it begs the question how the recommendations of the CSB cannot be accepted by an executive authority,” the petitioners said.
They said the promotion policy was very elaborate and gave due weight in terms of marks for every attribute necessary for consideration of promotion.
They argued the respondents might be directed to issue promotion notifications of the petitioners for BS-21 from the date, when the other officers were notified.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 23rd, 2014.
COMMENTS
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ