Delhi Services control: it’s like hiring an artisan and chopping off his limbs, says counsel in SC

As the Union government was not represented in hearing, Bench adjourns case for hearing after two weeks.

Pigeons fly past the dome of India's Supreme Court building in New Delhi, India, Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2016. India's top court on Tuesday agreed to re-examine a colonial-era law that makes homosexual acts punishable by up to a decade in prison. Gay activists cheered the court decision and said they were hopeful that the verdict would ultimately go in their favor, giving them a chance to live openly. (AP Photo/Tsering Topgyal)

Depriving the Delhi government control over the Services is like hiring an artisan and chopping off his limbs, Delhi government counsel and senior advocate K.V. Vishwanathan told the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

“Electing a government and then depriving it control over the Services would only cripple governance,” Mr. Vishwanathan submitted in court..

A five-judge Bench led by Justice Arun Mishra on Wednesday took up for hearing a reference made in February last by a Division Bench of Justices A.K. Sikri and Ashok Bhushan on whether the Delhi government has control over services. However, as the Union government was not represented in the hearing, the Bench adjourned the case for hearing after two weeks.

Mr. Vishwanathan later told

The Hindu, “ The Services is integral to the government. Officers are not just delegates of the government, they are, in fact, linked to the elected government".

The Sikri-Bhushan Bench gave a split opinion on the question of services on February 14, 2019. While Justice Bhushan held that the Delhi government has no power over services, Justice (now retired) Sikri, who was the lead judge on the Bench, took the middle path.

Justice Bhushan, in his separate opinion, said Entry 41 of the State List in the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution, dealing with ‘State Public Services’, was outside the purview of the Delhi Legislative Assembly.

Justice Sikri, on the other hand, concluded that files on the transfers and postings of officers in the rank of secretary, head of department and joint secretary could be directly submitted to the Lieutenant Governor (LG). As far as DANICS (Delhi Andamans Nicobar Islands Civil Service) cadre was concerned, the files could be processed through the Council of Ministers led by the Chief Minister to the LG, Justice Sikri wrote. Again, in case of a difference of opinion, the LG prevails.

Justice Sikri said there was need to evolve a “just and fair mechanism”. Calling the Delhi government's arguments that assumption of full and exclusive powers over the transfers and postings as “doubtful”, Justice Sikri said the situation in Delhi was “peculiar”.

The judge had proposed the setting up Civil Service Boards to take care of service matters in case of grade one, two, three and four officers. The board regarding grade four and three officers could be led by the Services Secretary and the other by the Chief Secretary.

The February 2019 judgment on individual appeals followed a Constitution Bench verdict on July 4, 2018. That Bench held that the LG was bound by the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers of the National Capital Territory (NCT) government.