The Delhi High Court has made a path-breaking judicial pronouncement regarding the allocation of the home state cadre under the All India Services Cadre Allocation Policy. The court has ruled that an officer seeking allocation to their home state cadre must necessarily indicate the home state as his/her first preference. The court made it clear that just by expressing willingness to serve in the home state through listing it as a lower preference will not do.
This observation was made by a Division Bench of Justices Navin Chawla and Madhu Jain.
The case involves the cadre allocation of an Indian Forest Service (IFS) officer. The officer had indicated willingness to work in his home state, Rajasthan, while filling the application form for the IFS Examination in 2009 but placed it as the sixth preference in his final cadre preference list.
On the basis of his merit position and the Centre’s cadre allocation policy, he was allotted the Nagaland cadre.
The officer moved the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT), which held that since Rajasthan was the officer’s home state and an insider vacancy existed, he should have been considered for allocation of the Rajasthan cadre even though it was his sixth preference. The CAT then directed the Centre to allocate the Rajasthan cadre to him by creating a supernumerary post
The Centre moved the High Court against this order. The court made a detailed analysis of Clauses 5 to 8 of the Cadre Allocation Policy, 2008, to hold that policy necessarily requires candidates to list their home state as their first preference if they wish to get their home state cadre as insiders.
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