HC seeks Centre’s stand on plea against using public servants to promote schemes

The petitioners referred to two communications issued by the CGDA and the DoPT in October

The Delhi High Court on Monday sought the Centre’s response on a plea opposing the use of public servants and defence personnel for promotion of government schemes and policies.

In their public interest litigation, ex-bureaucrat E.A.S. Sarma and former IIM Ahmedabad Dean Jagdeep S. Chhokar have challenged the communications issued by the Controller General of Defence Accounts (CGDA) on October 9 and the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) on October 17 on publicising the development activities of the Central government.

As per the plea, the CGDA asked various departments — such as the Defence Research and Development Organisation, Sainik School, and National Cadet Corps — to develop ‘selfie-points’ at prominent locations on the themes of their respective achievements. Meanwhile, the DoPT had decided to deploy public servants as special officers for showcasing the Centre’s achievements in the last nine years during the ‘Viksit Bharat Sankalp Yatra’ to be organised across the country from November 20, 2023 to January 25, 2024.

Advocate Prashant Bhushan, appearing for the petitioners, argued that the two communications amounted “to engaging civil servants/defence officers in campaigning for a particular political party, leading to wholesale politicisation of civil/defence services in general”. He also objected to the presence of photographs of the Prime Minister at these exercises.

Opposing the plea, Additional Solicitor General Chetan Sharma said the petitioners were wrongly assuming that the government was a political party. “Government of India and party are different things. This is pure government and for government. It is permissible. We will take instructions on nine years,” he submitted.

The High Court observed that using the Prime Minister or the Chief Minister’s picture was a norm and these could be seen on top of advertisements, unless the model code of conduct was in force.

Noting that there should not be any objection to a government popularising its welfare schemes, the High Court said, “When miners were trapped in the tunnel... the Indian Army and the NDRF did a phenomenal job. If the Army wants to popularise that, I don’t think there is a problem. There is no political party. There has to be a connection.”

It listed the case for further hearing on January 5 next year.