Saturday, July 8 2006 10:48 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: The Centre today (July 7, 2006) suffered an embarassment when Delhi High Court stayed the controversial move by Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss to sack AIIMS Director P Venugopal.

Shortly afterwards, Ramadoss said 'all legal course of action including an appeal in the Supreme Court, will be taken against the stay on the removal of Venugopal while a a buyoyed AIIMS Director announced he would attend office tomorrow and vowed not to compromise on the autonomy of the institute.

Granting the stay on Venugopal's petition challenging the recommendation by AIIMS apex body headed by Ramadoss to dismiss him, Justice Anil Kumar directed the Centre and the AIIMS to file their replies within two weeks on the matter.

He also issued notice to the Election Commission on Venugopal's petition seeking Ramadoss's disqualification from Parliament on the ground that the Minister by being the President of the Institute was guilty of holding an 'office of profit.'

Justice Kumar granted the stay in a packed court room after three hours of arguments by Additonal Solicitor General Gopal Subramaniam, who appeared for the Centre, and senior counsel Arun Jaitley who represented Venugopal.

The Additional Solicitor General disclosed to the court at the fag end of his arguments that the government had earlier asked Venugopal to gracefully resign on his own and only when he refused to do so, a decision was taken to terminate his services.

AIIMS resident doctors and faculty members, who went on a strike to protest the move remove Venugopal, welcomed the High Court's stay and called off the indefinite fast. Soon after the court order, the doctors had indicated that they would call off the strike but were discussing late tonight the course of action in the light of Ramadoss's remarks at a media conference that salaries of the strikers would be cut during t the strike period.

Apparently peeved over the manner in which the Institute's affairs are being run, Justice Kumar, during the hearing, said "it appears either the President (Minister) or the Director is running the whole show." The court made the observation after the Additonal Solicitor General defended the Government's move to appoint Dr Deka as Dean of the Institute without the approval of the search committee despite the incumbent being relatively junior to several other contenders.

Justice Kumar also wondered why the Government ignored the seniority list prepared by the Search Committee while picking up Deka for the post.

"Whatever, decisions the search committee takes can it be ignored? There must be a reason to ignore the same?," Justice Kumar queried, when Subramaniam admitted that Deka's appointment did not have the approval of either the Director or the Search Committee which had prepared a list of probables in which Deka figured only as the 17th preference.

The ASG's defence that Deka was picked up as several others in the list were on the verge of retirement failed to convince Justice Kumar who queried is he an exceptionally brilliant person?

Justice Kumar also asked Subramaniam as to why no agenda papers were circulated at the July 5 meeting in which a resolution was passed to terminate Venugopal's services. The ASG submitted that prior to the passing of the resolution, several efforts were made by the Government to persuade Venugopal to "gracefully" resign.

He disclosed that even the Secretary, Medical & Health had personally met the Director to seek his resignation but Venugopal remained adamant hence the Governing Council was compelled to pass a resolution for his termination.

The Additional Solicitor General, however, could not convince the court as to what prompted the government's decision to terminate Venugopal's services.

"It was a honest difference of opinion. But one of the reasons was the Director speaking to the media against the government," he said in response to queries from the judge.

Subramaniam rejected the allegation that the Minister had attracted disqualification from Parliament for holding an 'Office of Profit' by being the President of the Institute.

He reeled out a list of names since the past three decades including those of former Health Ministers Shatrughan Sinha and Sushma Swaraj who simultaneously held the post of the president of the Institute during their Cabinet tenure.

As the strike by AIIMS resident doctors and faculty members continued, patients had a tough time as the Emergency services were suspended and OPD functioned with skeletal staff.

The striking doctors opened a parallel OPD and claimed to have attended to 700 patients.