Finance Ministry Orders 12 Senior Govt Officers to Retire
Allegations of Corruption, Sexual Abuse
Twelve senior government officers, including a chief commissioner, principal commissioners and commissioner of the Income Tax Department, were directed by the Finance Ministry to retire under Rule 56 of the General Financial Rules (GFRs) on Monday.
As reported by NDTV, Officers who were shown the door on Monday included Ashok Agarwal (IRS, 1985), Joint Commissioner (Income Tax) on grounds of serious complaints of corruption and major extortion from businessmen, S K Srivastava (IRS, 1989), Commissioner (Appeal), Noida, accused of sexual harassment of two women IRS officers of Commissioner rank, Homi Rajvansh (IRS, 1985) who had acquired movable and immovable assets worth over Rs 3 crore in the name of self and his family members and BB Rajendra Prasad on allegations of obtaining illegal gratification in lieu of passing a favourable appeal order in a case.
Other officers in the list were Ajoy Kumar Singh, Alok Kumar Mitra, Chander Saini Bharti, Andasu Ravindar, Vivek Batra, Swetabh Suman and Ram Kumar Bhargava.
Though 56(j) that provides for compulsory retirement of government staff in public interest has existed for several decades, it has sparingly been invoked.
Under the section, the performance of an officer who has turned 50 or 55 or has completed 30 years of service (whichever is earlier,) is being reviewed to ascertain if he/she is liable for compulsory retirement.
