New Delhi [India], September 3 : The Delhi High Court on Wednesday issued notice to the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Border Security Force (BSF) in a PIL over the misuse of BSF and the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) Personnel for performing domestic servitude in the private residences of high ranking police and CAPF officers.
The Division bench headed by Chief Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyay sought a response and listed the matter for January next year.
This Public Interest Litigation (PIL) has been filed by a serving DIG of BSF, Sanjay Yadav.
The respondents questioned the locus of the petitioner. His counsel stated that he was also tried and punished for the misutilization of BSF manpower. This does not preclude him from raising this issue.
The court said that the issue raised by the petitioner exists. The petition has been moved through advocate Dr Surendra Singh Hooda.
It is stated in the petition that such a gross misuse of manpower, especially at a time when there are over 83,000 vacancies in CAPFs and Assam Rifles, poses a serious threat to national security and law and order, apart from causing an undue strain on the public exchequer.
The petitioner has highlighted that it is virtually a practice in vogue wherein various soldiers of the BSF are diverted from performing official duties on the border or on law-and-order duties and are detailed for performing domestic functions in the private houses of high-ranking officers.
"Our country's soldiers are even deployed specifically to take care of a high-ranking officer's dog. The petitioner, being a serving Deputy Inspector General in BSF, has first-hand knowledge of the said practice," the plea said.
It is also said that after realising the alarming situation and sought to rectify the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) issued an Office Memorandum (OM) on 21.09.2016.
The said OM directed all Chief Secretaries of State Governments, Union Territories, heads of Central Armed
Police Forces & Assam Rifles, Central Police Organisations and Director General of Police in the State Governments to ensure that various privileges such as personnel at residences, vehicles, personal security, etc., are withdrawn within a period of one month after retirement, the plea said.
The OM further provided that in the event a retired officer fails to follow the above instructions, they should be required to pay for the various privileges, including those afforded to serving officials. Those who fail to withdraw unauthorised manpower and privileges should be proceeded against, it added.
After the issuance of the DoPT OM, BSF compiled a list of as many as 131 personnel who were performing duties unauthorizedly with various retired Police and CAPF officers. In fact, the total number of personnel unauthorizedly deployed is much higher, the plea emphasised.
The petitioner has claimed that even after compilation of the list, the BSF authorities have failed to take any action to withdraw the unauthorised manpower or to recover payment from retired officers in respect of such unauthorised manpower use.
It is stated that certain isolated cases of withdrawal may exist; however, the general practice of unauthorised deployment of manpower continues rampantly. It is necessary to state that the petitioner only has first-hand information about non-compliance of the DoPT OM and continued unauthorised deployment of manpower in the Border Security Force.
The petitioner highlighted, as he claims, the said issues by way of a Legal Notice, but the authorities have not taken any action to remedy the situation. Therefore, a thorough and detailed inquiry by an independent authority is required to assess the exact misuse of manpower by high-ranking officials and its adverse impact on the safety and security of the country, the plea said.