Whistleblower Chaturvedi cleared to join Uttarakhand cadre

Naveen S Garewal

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Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, August 17

After a long struggle, the Appointment Committee of the Cabinet (ACC), headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has finally approved a cadre change for Ramon Magsaysay Award winner Haryana Cadre IFS officer Sanjiv Chaturvedi.

The Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) issued an order allowing a cadre change on August 14.

It took almost three years of pleading, including intervention of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) and a contempt notice to the government, before his request for the cadre change from Haryana to Uttarakhand was allowed.

Chaturvedi told The Tribune: "I wish the government would have respected the CAT order. Everyone would have been spared of the hardship. As I have received the order now, I look forward to a new beginning in Uttarakhand.”

An order issued by the Department of Personnel and Training said, “The Appointment Committee of the Cabinet has approved the proposal for inter-cadre transfer of Sanjiv Chaturvedi from Haryana to Uttarakhand.” 

A Deputy Secretary with the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi, Chaturvedi recently won the Magsaysay Award for 2015 for fighting corruption. He requested a cadre change in 2012 on grounds of “extreme hardship” after being put through 12 transfers in 5 years, a suspension, two major penalty chargesheets issued for removal from service, false police and vigilance cases for taking on politicians and bureaucrats allegedly plundering the forest wealth of Haryana.

The 2002-batch IFS officer shot into limelight after he was removed from the post of AIIMS Chief Vigilance Officer last year after he exposed corruption in the institute.

In 2014, the Haryana Government issued a no-objection certificate on his request for the cadre change. A month later the same year, the Uttarakhand Government agreed to accept him. The MoEFCC also supported his request for cadre change and sent the case for final approval to the ACC. Since Chaturvedi’s crusade against corruption had embarrassed the Union Government, the ACC sent back the case to the MoEFCC saying the officer should get fresh “no objection” certificates from Haryana and Uttarakhand.

CAT stayed the ACC order. The tribunal upheld his petition alleging “discrimination” and “malafide”. Quashing the order of the ACC to seek fresh no-objection certificates on May 5, 2015, CAT gave two months to the government to decide the case.  When nothing happened in those two months, Chaturvedi moved a contempt petition against the Union Government. This forced the PM’s Office to intervene.