The Bombay High Court on Tuesday dismissed a plea by IPS officer Abdur Rahman seeking voluntary retirement and held that the verdict of the December 2023 Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) rejecting his plea for VRS did not warrant any court’s interference.

“Resultantly, the writ petition fails, which is hereby dismissed,” a division bench of Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Arif S Doctor held.

Rahman’s candidature was announced by the Prakash Ambedkar-led Vanchit Bahujan Aghadi (VBA) for Dhule Lok Sabha constituency this year. In his plea filed earlier this year, Rahman had sought that he had to relinquish his office as he had been fielded for the upcoming elections. He therefore sought that rejection of his VRS application by authorities be set aside.

However, he could not contest the polls as the HC had refused to dispose of his plea prior to the last date for filing nominations for LS elections.

Senior advocate Arshad Shaikh and advocate Jasim A Shaikh for the 1997 batch IPS officer had submitted that he resigned from his post of Inspector General (IG), State Human Rights Commission in 2019 to protest against the Citizen Amendment Act (CAA) Bill passed by the Rajya Sabha. However, his resignation and earlier applications for VRS were not accepted.

After Rahman had tendered his resignation, the government authority concerned had said the issue related to his VRS application was pending before the judicial forums.

Rahman had challenged before the CAT an October 2019 order by Union and state home ministries rejecting his request for VRS. He had initially sought voluntary retirement in 2017, which was withdrawn by him and once again requested for the same in March, 2018 under Rule 16 (2-A) of the All India Services (Death-cum-Retirement Benefits) Rules, 1938.

The second request was rejected by the government in 2018 on the grounds that disciplinary proceedings were pending against him, which were closed in January 2019. Rahman made a third application for VRS, which was rejected by the Union Home Ministry in October 2019, which he had challenged before the CAT through an appeal. However, in December last year the Mumbai bench of the tribunal dismissed his appeal, prompting him to approach the High Court.

The bench observed that there were three charge-sheets issued against the petitioner and the June 17, 2020 chargesheet alleged offences of violating service rules by contracting a second marriage while the first marriage subsisted, mentally and physically harassing his first wife and children and compelling them to accept his second marriage.

Moreover the October, 2020 and June, 2020 chargesheets related to misconduct due to speech delivered by him during a function held on March 29, 2019. The HC noted that the charges were related to the period prior to the date on which the petitioner had applied for VRS.

However, the bench “left it to the competent/appointing authority to decide whether the said charge would entail any major or minor penalties” and said that “it was not for HC to pre-judge any such issue.”