Former Excise Commissioner Ashok Lal suspended

According to a senior official, following a complaint against Lal, an Indian Administrative Service officer of the 1981 batch, was transferred as Revenue (Appeals) Secretary. Following his suspension order, which was served on him on Thursday, he has been relieved from that post too. Principal Secretary (Revenue) Nand Lal will now hold additional charge of Revenue (Appeals).

“We have invoked provisions of the All India Civil Service and Disciplinary Rules to suspend Ashok Lal. Under the rules, the State Government is empowered to suspend an IAS official with the permission of the Centre, which may be obtained subsequently. In view of the serious charges against Lal, the Centre will not hesitate to clear the proposal,” the official added.

The complaint was filed by one Anilkumar Bhalchandra Paropkari with the Election Commission of India, the then Chief Minister Narayan Rane and Chief Electoral Officer D K Sankaran alleging that Ashok Lal was misusing his power and also collected election funds on behalf of the then Prohibition and Excise Minister Prakash Mehta, a senior leader of the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Taking serious note of the corruption charges, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) M S Gill had on August 19, asked Sankaran to conduct a high-level probe into the of functioning of Ashok Lal and submit a comprehensive report. Following CEC’s instructions, Rane appointed Additional Chief Secretary V Ranganathan to probe into the charges against Ashok Lal and also shifted him to the less important department of Revenue (Appeals).

While the inquiry by Ranganathan was in progress, Bhalchandra Veer, who replaced Ashok Lal, suspended four senior officials including two assistant commissioners for their alleged role in the allotment of licences to new liquor shops.

Preliminary inquiries by Ranganathan revealed that though it was not in his jurisdiction, Ashok Lal had re-validated a record number of 60 licences and also permitted inter-district transfer of licences in blatant violation of the existing rules and guidelines. Though Ranganathan had submitted his report to Chief Secretary Arun Bongirwar on October, no action could be initiated against Lal since there was virtually no government.

“In fact disciplinary action should have been taken against him on that day itself, but since the caretaker government was at the helm of affairs, the file was not processed,” the official said.

Subsequently, after Vilasrao Deshmukh took over, the General Administration Department expeditiously processed the file and decided to suspend Ashok Lal. “As per rules, the suspension order required the approval of Excise Minister Vasant Chavan as well as the permission of the Chief Minister before,” the official said.

According to the official, following recommendations by the one-man Ranganathan committee, the State Government has also revoked all the decisions taken by Ashok Lal during his three-month tenure as the Excise Commissioner.