The Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) has quashed the compulsory retirement of IPS officer Gurjinder Pal Singh and ordered his reinstatement with all associated benefits within four weeks. Singh, a 1991-batch officer who held the rank of ADG in Chhattisgarh, was compulsorily retired from service after being raided by the state’s anti-corruption bureau. He also faced a sedition case during the tenure of the Bhupesh Baghel government.

The CAT, comprising chairman Justice Ranjit More and member Anand Mathur, deemed the order of compulsory retirement as a shortcut to avoid a departmental inquiry and stated that it could not be sustained legally.

Singh, in his submission before the CAT, stated that as the ADGP-ACB/EOW, he was in charge of high-profile and sensitive probes, including the Nagrik Apoorti Nigam scam. He mentioned facing repeated political pressure from the higher echelons of the state government to conduct the probe as per their instructions, but he refused to comply.

As a consequence, he was transferred to the police headquarters without any assignment and was then made the director of the state police academy. Singh argued that the government, after a lapse of over four years, constituted an inquiry committee into the suicide of Bilaspur SP Rahul Sharma. He further stated that he approached the Jabalpur bench of the tribunal, which stayed the panel proceedings.