Centre rejects AIS officers' requests, asks them to report to AP

The Centre has asked All India Services (AIS) officers, who were allocated to Andhra Pradesh but were working in Telangana to report to the former, according to official orders.The orders were issued by the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT). These IAS and IPS officers were allocated to Andhra Pradesh at the time of its bifurcation. IAS officers Ronald Rose and Amrapali Kata who were allocated to the Andhra Pradesh cadre after State bifurcation, had requested, to be allowed to continue in the Telangana cadre. Now, they have been relieved with immediate effect, and directed to report in Andhra Pradesh by October 16.However, they had been working in Telangana following favourable orders from the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT).
The decision was taken based on the recommendations of the Deepak Khandekar committee, which was tasked with reviewing requests from AIS (All India Services) officers, to swap cadres during the allocation of AIS officers after the bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh in 2014. The committee found that these requests to swap cadres was beyond the scope of the established principles, which had already been upheld by the High Court. Further, the committee underscored that the cadre allocations were based on factual records and the same criteria was applied to all officers during the bifurcation.
The Ministry stated that the allocation of officers from the undivided cadre of Andhra Pradesh was done uniformly and in accordance with material facts. The Telangana High Court had also reiterated the need for adherence to these guidelines, ruling that any deviation would be discriminatory. The court has also noted that the officer’s attempt to challenge the guidelines constituted an overreach into policymaking.
 The Ministry is likely to issue similar instructions with regard to around 11 other IAS and IPS officers working in Telangana including IAS officers A Vani Prasad (1995 batch), Vakati Karuna (2004), and M Prashanti (2009), along with IPS officers Anjani Kumar (1990), Abhilasha Bisht (1994) and Cyberabad Police Commissioner Abhishek Mohanty (2011) among others.