SC Dismisses Challenges to Appointments of Vigilance Commissioners

Supreme Court dismisses PILs against appointments that had termed them arbitrary and illegal.

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed the PILs filed against the appointments of KV Chaudhary as Central Vigilance Commissioner and TM Bhasin as Vigilance Commissioner in June 2015. The appointments had been challenged by NGO Common Cause (and several former public servants), which had alleged that the appointments were “arbitrary, illegal and in violation of the principle of institutional integrity.”

Justices Arun Mishra and MM Shantangoudar, however, were not convinced, saying “We find no ground to quash the appointments.” The case had been filed in 2015, soon after the appointments, and the judges had reserved their judgment in the matter in September 2017.

The Allegations Against Chaudhary and Bhasin

The petitioners had argued that the appointments of Chaudhary as CVC and Bhasin as VC were illegal since they went against the guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court in previous cases. According to the landmark CPIL case, appointments to the Vigilance Commission must be made keeping in mind its “institutional integrity”.

The petitioners, represented by advocate Prashant Bhushan had alleged that there were serious charges of impropriety against both Chaudhary and Bhasin, which had been overlooked by the committee that had appointed them.

Questions were raised over Chaudhary’s involvement in the Stockguru scam and the controversy over visitors to former CBI director Ranjit Sinha’s official residence. The petitioners also alleged that Chaudhary had under-assessed the income of a company owned by Ponty Chadha by Rs 234 crore during his time at the CBDT.

Bhasin had ironically been indicted by the CVC in 2013 on allegations of forging and tampering with appraisal reports.

Government’s Defence of Appointments

The Centre defended the appointments through Attorney General KK Venugopal and Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta. They pointed out that the appointments had been cleared by a three-member committee that included the Prime Minister, Home Minister and Leader of Opposition.

The Centre had dealt with the Supreme Court’s detailed questioning, which had raised concerns that only persons who had applied for the posts had been considered, even though the selection committee was supposed to consider other candidates who were suitable for the job as well.

The Centre had, however, insisted that they had followed protocol and had obtained clearance from all relevant agencies before appointing Chaudhary and Bhasin. Upon consideration of all the relevant files, the judges also agreed that there were no reasons to interfere with the appointments, which will run till June 2019.