Court raps govt for delaying visually challenged’s IAS posting

Thanks to intervention by Delhi High Court, visually challenged Ravi Prakash is all set to become an IAS officer within six months. He had been waiting since 2006 when he cleared the Civil Services Examination.

Thanks to intervention by Delhi High Court, visually challenged Ravi Prakash is all set to become an IAS officer within six months. He had been waiting since 2006 when he cleared the Civil Services Examination.

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Taking serious note of the Department of Personnel and Training’s delay in his appointment forcing him to approach the court, a bench of Justices AK Sikri and Suresh Kait imposed a cost of the Rs 25,000 on them.

The bench further directed the government to fill seven other posts, lying vacant since 1996, under the quota for disabled persons.

The bench accepted the arguments of S K Rungta, Prakash’s counsel, that as per the Disabilities Act the government should give one per cent of positions to the visually challenged out of three per cent reservation for the handicapped in the appointment of government jobs.

The government had argued that the posts can only be calculated from 2005 when the posts for the visually disabled had been identified.

Since 1996, the government has not filled the posts for visually handicapped persons and by now there are eight such posts which are vacant, Rungta told the court.