The Gujarat High Court today issued a notice to the Election Commission on a PIL seeking the court's direction to the state to appoint a full-time director general of police.
The division bench of Chief Justice R Subhash Reddy and Justice V M Pancholi allowed the petitioner to add the Election Commission as a respondent and issued a notice to the poll body. The reply to the notice is to be filed by next Wednesday.
The state government, in its reply to the petition, had said it cannot appoint a full-time DGP at present due to the Model Code of Conduct in force ahead of next month's Assembly election.
The petitioner, former IPS officer Rahul Sharma, contended that in such a case, the government could seek permission from the EC for making the appointment.
He then asked for court's permission to add the EC as a respondent.
The PIL said that Gujarat had not had a permanent DGP since April 15, 2016 when P C Thakur was replaced by an in-charge DGP, P P Pandey.
A petition in the Supreme Court by former senior police officer Julio Ribeiro led to the state government revoking the appointment of P P Pandey, following which Geeta Johri was appointed as another in-charge DGP.
An in-charge DGP is vulnerable to political machinations and pressure, and it weakens the police administration and functioning, the PIL said.
As per the Bombay Police (Gujarat Amendment) Act, 2007, the state must have a full-time DGP with a minimum tenure of two years, it said.
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