Bombay HC quashes CM Eknath Shinde's decision over recruitment in co-op bank

The Nagpur bench of the Bombay High Court has quashed the decision of Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde to stay the recruitment process of a cooperative bank noting that the CM has no powers to review or modify the calls taken by the minister concernedA division bench of Justices Vinay Joshi and Valmiki SA Menezes in its order of March 3 termed Shindes decision wholly unwarranted and without authority of lawThe order was passed on a petition filed by Chandrapur District Central Cooperative Bank Ltd and a businessman named Santoshsingh Rawat who had been elected as its chairman opposing Shindes decisionAccording to the plea the CMs order was passed at the behest of local politiciansAlso Read Plea filed in HC against Maharashtra state govt employees strikeThe court held that the chief minister has no independent power assigned under the Rules of Business and Instructions to review or modify the decision taken by the incharge ministerThe intervention of the Chief Minister is wholly unwarranted and without the authority of law The Chief Minister has no independent power under the Business Rules and Instructions to interfere into the subject which was allocated to the InchargeMinister the court said in the orderThe CM was not the head of the Cooperation Department but the said department was assigned to a separate minister the bench saidThere is no authoritypower vested in the Chief Minister as per Rules of Business and Instructions to have supervisory powers over the decision taken by the concerned Minister Nor do the Rules indicate that the Minister is subordinate to the Chief Minister as regards independent functioning of a department assigned to him by the Rules it addedThe court further held that the minister in charge of a department is responsible for the affairs thereof and the ministers directives would assume the character of an order passed by the state governmentNo doubt the order of granting permission for recruitment is of administrative nature which can be reviewed but only by the InchargeMinister The intervention of the Chief Minister is not authorized under the Business Rules and the Instructions issued thereunder it saidThe petitioners had said that the proposal for filling up 393 posts was sanctioned by the minister incharge in September last year after an inquiryThe plea further said that the CMs order was passed at the behest of local politicians and that it did not take into consideration the fact that the bank was facing an acute staff shortage making it impossible to run 93 branchesThe CM had in November 2022 stayed the recruitment processThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever