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SC sets aside HC order on Ashok Khemka’s appraisal report
HC had on March 18, 2019, ordered that the remarks recorded and grading done by the CM as accepting authority were liable to be expunged and set aside. Also, the court said the grading of 9.92 given by the minister as the reviewing authority is restored. The HC order was challenged by the state government in the SC.
The Supreme Court (SC) on Monday set aside a March 2019 Punjab and Haryana high court (HC) order by which the HC had overturned the remarks and grading made by Haryana chief minister ML Khattar in the performance appraisal report (PAR) of senior IAS officer, Ashok Khemka.
The high court had on March 18, 2019, ordered that the remarks recorded and grading done by the CM as accepting authority were liable to be expunged and set aside. Also, the court said the grading of 9.92 given by the minister as the reviewing authority is restored. The HC order was challenged by the state government in the SC.
An apex court bench of justice Vikram Nath and justice Satish Chandra Sharma on Monday said they are of the opinion that the HC division bench erred in law. “Accordingly, we set aside the judgement of the division bench of the high court. As we have been informed that the accepting authority is yet to take a decision on the underlying representation, we direct the accepting authority to take a decision on it under rule 9(7B) of the PAR rules within a period of 60 days from the date of pronouncement of this judgement,” the apex court said. The SC said, thereafter, the IAS officer is granted liberty to take recourse to remedies as may be available under the law.
In-depth understanding needed in grading IAS officers
The apex court in its order said that the overall grading and assessment of an IAS officer required an in-depth understanding of various facets of an administrative functionary such as personality traits, tangible and quantifiable professional parameters which may include inter alia the competency and ability to execute projects, adaptability, problem-solving and decision-making skills, planning and implementation capabilities and the skill to formulate and evaluate strategy.
The SC said that these indicative parameters were typically then analysed by adopting a specialised evaluation matrix and, thereafter, synthesised by a competent authority to award an overall grade to the candidate at the end of the appraisal.
“Accordingly, in our considered view, the process of evaluation of an IAS officer, more so a senior IAS officer entails a depth of expertise, rigorous and robust understanding of the evaluation matrix coupled with nuanced understanding of the proficiency required to be at the forefront of the bureaucracy. This administrative oversight ought to have been left to the executive on account of it possessing the requisite expertise and mandate for the said task,” the bench said.
HC entered into specialised domain without having expertise
The bench said that it was their opinion that the high court entered into a specialised domain i.e., evaluating the competency of an IAS officer by way of contrasting and comparing the remarks and overall grades awarded to Khemka by the reporting authority, the reviewing authority and the accepting authority, without the requisite domain expertise and administrative experience to conduct such an evaluation.
The HC ought not to have ventured into the said domain particularly when the accepting authority is yet to pronounce its decision qua the underlying representation, the SC said.
What led to litigation
Khattar as the accepting authority of IAS officer’s performance appraisal report had reduced Khemka’s score to 9 from 9.92 given by science and technology minister Anil Vij as the reviewing authority. The chief secretary, who is the reporting authority of the officer, had given him a score of 8.22.
The high court on March 18 ordered that the remarks recorded and grading done by the chief minister as accepting authority were liable to be expunged and set aside. Also, the court said the grading of 9.92 given by the minister as the reviewing authority is restored.
While grading Khemka, Vij had remarked that the officer is well-known for effective professional integrity under very difficult circumstances. Despite being in a relatively unimportant post, Khemka has shown excellent achievements under severe constraints, he wrote.
The chief minister in his remarks said that Vij had differed from the chief secretary but not given any reason for the same, and Vij’s report as reviewing authority was slightly exaggerated.
