Delhi Chief Secretary calls Saurabh Bharadwaj’s office ‘politically compromised’, minister accused him of ‘leaking’ report

Kumar, in the report, attached a screenshot of a post by the AAP’s X (formerly Twitter) handle and said that it was made six hours before he received the directions to file a report in the matter on his email at 10.15 pm on Sunday.

The AAP handle, he said, had already posted the note at 4.15 pm. “This becomes more important when the Hon’ble Minister is asking for an ATR within 6 hours from the undersigned,” he said.

Bharadwaj, in turn, accused Kumar of “leaking” the report to the media, adding it raised doubts about his political neutrality. The matter, however, escalated with Kumar proposing the suspension of Bharadwaj’s secretary, and initiating “major penalty proceedings” against him for “engaging in political activities”, to the National Capital Civil Service Authority (NCCSA).

Since the passage of the GNCTD (Amendment) Act in August this year, the matters of transfers and posting of officers in Delhi government are decided by the authority, of which the Chief Minister, Chief Secretary and Principal Secretary (Home) are members.

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has, in the past, called the meetings of the authority a “farce” since the bureaucrats are in a majority in the three-member body.

Kumar, who was to retire from service in November, was given an extension of six months as the Delhi Chief Secretary by the Centre. The move was opposed by the AAP government in the Supreme Court, which ruled that granting extension to the Chief Secretary “cannot be construed to be violative of law”.

The latest matter relates to the sexual harassment complaint of a woman, who was working as housekeeping staff on contract basis at the Burari Government Hospital, against her supervisors. An FIR in the matter was registered on December 19.

On Sunday, Bharadwaj had directed the Chief Secretary to form a committee to probe the allegations and submit an ATR within six hours.
The report stated that an Internal Complaints Committee (ICC) formed by the health secretary and Medical Director of Burari Hospital had terminated the contract of the four housekeeping supervisors accused of sexual harassment by women workers and had requested the Delhi Police to inquire into the matter expeditiously.

While Bharadwaj, earlier on Monday, said that he had not received the ATR, he later alleged that the report was leaked by the office of the senior bureaucrat to the media. “It is very surprising that the Chief Secretary Naresh Kumar’s office leaked the ATR to the media. This raises doubts about the political neutrality of CS Naresh Kumar and strict disciplinary action should be taken against him and officers working with him for leaking the report…” a statement released by Bharadwaj said.

He also asked the Delhi Commission for Women chairperson, Swati Maliwal, to look into the matter as the ATR “contains the report of ICC”.

“This ICC report, which has been shared widely by the CS office with the media, will also prejudice the police investigation which is at a very nascent stage. This will help the men who are accused of sexual harassment and asking for sexual favours from poor contractual women workers,” Bharadwaj said.

Notably, the ATR contains the names of ICC members and mentions the names of the accused. However, it does not disclose the identity of the complainants.

Curated For You

CAT 2025 Answer Key LIVE Updates: Response sheet out at iimcat.ac.in

Why IndiGo has been hit so hard by new flight duty time limitation rules, explained

Dhurandhar Movie Review LIVE Updates: Ranveer Singh film’s climax packs a punch, says early reviews; sells 225,000 tickets