IMPORTANT POINT
The importance of providing reasons for disagreement with the remarks and grading given by the Reviewing Authority in the context of APAR assessments.

JUDGMENT

Sanjeev Sachdeva, J. (Oral) - Petitioner seeks quashing of orders dated 05.03.2019, 10.06.2019 and 08.01.2020 whereby, the representations of petitioner dated 11.10.2018, 02.04.2019 and 29.07.2019 respectively have been dismissed.

2. Petitioner had represented and sought expunction of remarks and lower grading of "GOOD" in APAR of the petitioner for the period 01.04.2017 to 05.01.2018.

3. Petitioner was enrolled in Central Reserve Police Force on 28.12.2002, he was promoted to the rank of Second-in-Command in January 2015.

4. As per the petitioner he has got grading of "VERY GOOD" to "OUTSTANDING" for the period prior to the period in issue i.e. 01.04.2017 to 05.01.2018. For the subject period, the Initiating Officer was the Commandant and he gave a grading of "GOOD" to petitioner which is below benchmark.

5. The Reviewing Officer, who was of the rank of DIG, disagreed with the Initiating Officer and graded the petitioner "VERY GOOD". Thereafter, the Accepting Authority agreed with the Reporting Officer and had given him a grading of "GOOD".

6. Learned counsel for the petitioner submits that in May 2017 petitioner was made a Member of Board for procurement of sports equipment and as per him, the Commandant had required him to award the contract and make procurement from one particular individual and since petitioner disagreed with the same, the Initiating Officer i.e. the Commandant gave an adverse grading to the petitioner.

7. Learned counsel submits that prior to the said period and post the subject period, petitioner has attained above benchmark grading of "VERY GOOD" and even "OUTSTANDING". He submits that in the period immediately preceding the period in issue, same Initiating Officer i.e. the Commandant had graded petitioner as "OUTSTANDING".

8. Learned counsel submits that Accepting Authority is obliged to give reasons in case there is a disagreement between the remarks or grading given by the Initiating Officer and the Reviewing Authority.

9. Per contra, learned counsel for respondent submits that the petitioner had earned DG's displeasure during the relevant period and as such the Initiating Officer had graded petitioner "GOOD". Learned counsel further submits that there is no material which substantiates the allegation of the petitioner that there was any direction by the Commandant to the petitioner to favor some individual in award of contract and since they are unsubstantiated, no credence can be given to the same.

10. Reference may be had to the Standing Order 56/2001 dated 18.10.2001 on the subject "Preparation and Maintenance of Annual Confidential Report of Officer". Clause 6.16 thereof reads as under:

"6.16 The Reviewing/Superior Reviewing Officer with whom the ACR files are available should go through the assessment made by the reporting officer, and also, based on his personal knowledge can suo moto update or downgrade the ACR. If necessary, he should enquire about the reason for such sudden variation from the reporting/reviewing officers. However, the Reviewing/Superior Reviewing Officer should invariably record his reasons for such up-gradation/down-gradation of the ACR. In some cases, it has been noticed that the reviewing officer or SRO, while disagreeing the assessment made by the initiating officer, does not give reasons for his disagreement with the comments of the reporting officer which is a must. Some of the reviewing officers and SROs merely stated that the officer reported upon has been under rated or over-rated without giving any specific comments, which is bad in law. Various courts of law in their rulings and directions have categorically specified that in case reasons are not given, such gradings should not be taken into consideration. It is, therefore binding on all the reviewing officer/SROs that they should record specific reasons for their disagreement with a particular aspect of the report given by the reporting officer."

11. Clause 6.16 of the Standing Order mandates the Reviewing/Superio