Date:26/04/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/04/26/stories/2008042658800300.htm

Andhra Pradesh - Hyderabad

State-EC tussle reason for Collector transfer?

Special Correspondent

HYDERABAD: The Election Commission’s directive for transfer of Praveen Prakash, Collector of Ranga Reddy district is being interpreted by senior IAS officers, as the culmination of a protracted bureaucratic tussle between the Commission and Andhra Pradesh Government.

The issue became contentious between the ECI and the Government when the ECI recommended initiating disciplinary action against Mr. Praveen Prakash, after he was transferred out of Visakhapatnam district in January 2006.

After the ECI had asked the Government to initiate disciplinary action against Mr. Prakash, a show cause notice was issued to him. The Government had dropped action against Mr. Prakash after he replied to the notice and this was objected to by the Election Commission, sources explained.

There was protracted correspondence between the Government and the Commission on the propriety of dropping action.

The Government contended that it was the ‘final disciplinary authority’ as per the conduct rules of the civil servants and that the ECI’s directive for initiating action was only ‘recommendatory’ in nature.

Officers say the attention of the ECI was drawn to the fact that Mr. Prakash was already transferred out of Visakhapatnam as per its directions.

Sources disclosed that the ECI sent several reminders to the Government about the ‘action’ to be initiated against Mr. Prakash and the latter steadfastly maintained that it was satisfied with the reply given to the show cause notice by the officer.