All India Conference of Central Administrative Tribunal (Cat) to Open Tomorrow

First Rajiv Gandhi Lecture on Administrative Law to be Delivered by an Australian Judge

The All India Conference of the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) will be held here tomorrow. The Conference, which is being held in the Silver Jubilee year of the CAT, would be inaugurated Mr. Justice Altamas Kabir, a senior Judge of the Supreme Court. This would be followed by in house discussion on the agenda items raised by the Members and the session would be chaired by the Chairman, CAT, Justice V.K. Bali.

In the afternoon session, the first Rajiv Gandhi Lecture on Administrative Law will be delivered by Justice Michael Donald Kirby, Retd Judge of the High Court of Australia. Justice Kirby would be speaking on the Modern Administrative State and would share the Australian experience in this regard. This would be attended by the Ministers of Personnel Training and also Law & Justice.

The Administrative Tribunals in India were set up in 1985 and function from 17 Benches across the country. These Tribunals are unique in the sense that the Members of these Tribunals are both from the Administrative as well as Judicial side. Each Division Bench comprises of a judicial & administrative Member. The Administrative Tribunals in India are different from the Tribunals functioning in some other countries as the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT) here was set up solely with the purpose of dealing with the cases relating to the recruitment and conditions of service of persons appointed to public services and posts under the control of the Government and thereby, reducing the burden of the High Courts to that extent.

The Conference being held is an Annual Conference which is generally held on 1st Nov every year as this was the day the CAT was established. It is attended by all the Members of the CAT where agenda items brought up by the various Members and other issues being faced by the Tribunal are discussed and recommendations of the Conference are sent to the Government for action. This year is being celebrated as the ‘Silver Jubilee” year of the setting up of the CAT.

There are 33 members of the CAT from the judicial side and 33 from the Administrative. Of the 66 Members, some have retired and the process of appointing new members is already in place. The Conference would be attended by about 55 Members, besides the other invitees from the Supreme Court, Delhi High Court and the Government. As far as the Judicial Members of the CAT are concerned, most of them are retired judges of the High Courts and some are Members of the Bar. On the administrative side, the Members are retired Secretaries /Additional Secretaries to the Govt of India.

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