LAHORE: The Lahore High Court has ruled that the right to withdraw an officer sent on deputation is always retained by the parent department and even the borrowing authority cannot refuse to repatriate him.

Justice Anwaar Hussain issued the ruling dismissing a petition of a police officer from Punjab who challenged his repatriation from the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) before the expiry of the deputation period.

Petitioner Muzammil Hayat, a sub-inspector of Punjab Police, was transferred to the FIA on deputation for three years. He joined the agency and was posted in the FIA Directorate General, Islamabad.

During his deputation with the FIA, a murder FIR was registered against him in Jhang wherein he obtained pre-arrest bail. On account of registration of the case the police department requested the FIA to repatriate the petitioner enabling the former to initiate departmental proceedings against him.

The FIA repatriated the petitioner, who challenged the same before the court.

A counsel for the petitioner argued that his client had been repatriated before lapse of the deputation period without any lawful justification.

He said whenever services of a Punjab Police officer are lent to any other department, it is the borrowing agency which has to initiate and complete the disciplinary proceedings and, if found guilty of misconduct, it can impose minor penalty upon the officer and has to refer the matter to lending agency only if a major penalty is to be imposed.

The law officers of the federal and the provincial governments opposed the petition.

In his judgement, Justice Hussain observed that the petitioner being a deputationist has no vested right to claim continuity of service for the total period of his deputation for which he was borrowed by the FIA.

The judge said the right to withdraw/transfer the deputationist is always retained by the provincial police officer and even the borrowing authority cannot refuse repatriation once it receives the request of repatriation of the officer.

The judge further said the petitioner, as a member of the police department, is expected rather obligated to maintain discipline and therefore, cannot be allowed to wriggle out of his duty to obey and concede to the order of the competent authority seeking his repatriation.

He maintained that if such a concession is allowed to the members of a disciplined force like the police, it will wreak havoc with the discipline, which the police is required to maintain, in larger public interest.

“In the present case, the borrowing agency has itself repatriated the petitioner which is not an adverse order as observed earlier, and therefore, the petitioner is left with no choice but to report to his parent department,” Justice Hussain concluded the judgement.

Published in Dawn, October 22th, 2023