The Hyderabad bench of Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) has cancelled the appointment of V Dinesh Reddy as the Andhra Pradesh director general of police, acting on a plea filed principal secretary (home) P Gautam Kumar who had accused the state government of violating the supreme court order in Prakash Singh case in appointing Reddy. Kumar had reasoned that as per the order, the state government had to send a list of three eligible officers to the UPSC for selection as the DGP.

However, Prakash Singh, former DGP, Uttar Pradesh, and former DG, BSF, whose PIL led to the landmark judgment leading to police reforms, is sad at the development. He told Governance Now that senior officers filing litigation against DGP’s appointment in Andhra Pradesh is neither good for the state nor for its law and order. While agreeing that the state government had not followed procedure in appointing Reddy, Singh asserted that departmental politics, which is very high in AP, is to blame for the present mess. “Bureaucrats and politicians are responsible for this departmental politics,” says Singh. The illustrated officer who is known to be an expert on internal security fears that such unpleasant developments will hamper the well-executed anti-Maoists movement in the state in due course of time.

It is third time in a row in AP that the appointment of the state’s top cop is challenged in the Hyderabad bench of CAT. Before this, appointments of RR Girish Kumar and K Arvind Rao were also set aside by CAT.