Indian Police Service officer G. Sampath Kumar, accused of extorting money from bookies involved in the 2013 Indian Premier League betting and match-fixing scam, has filed a writ petition in the Madras High Court challenging an order passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal on September 11, 2015, upholding a charge memo issued to him by the Home Secretary on April 9, 2014. A Division Bench of Justices Huluvadi G. Ramesh and RMT. Teekaa Raman on Tuesday ordered notices, returnable by two weeks, to the Registrar of CAT as well as the Home Secretary. In his affidavit, the petitioner stated that he was appointed as Deputy Superintendent of Police through the Tamil Nadu Public Service Commission on December 16, 1991 and got conferred with IPS in 2009.
It was during his stint as Superintendent of Police, Q Branch CID (Internal Security) that he had unearthed a wide network of bookies while investigating a fake passport racket case. Subsequently, the case was taken up for investigation by the Crime Branch Criminal Investigation Department (CB-CID) sleuths and false charges of extortion of money were levelled against him with ulterior motives, he claimed.
The charge memo issued to him in 2014 levelled eight charges. Though he challenged the memo, the CAT upheld it in 2015. Thereafter, he participated in the departmental enquiry without prejudice to his right to challenge the charge memo, the petitioner said and urged the High Court to quash it since it had been issued without prior approval of the Chief Minister who was the disciplinary authority under the All India Services (Conduct) Rules of 1968.
