Centre discharges Puja Khedkar from IAS with immediate effect

Pune: The central govt has discharged Puja Manorama Dilip Khedkar from the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) with immediate effect amid accusations of cheating and wrongly availing OBC and disability quota benefits to secure her selection in the IAS 2023 batch.A senior officer from the department of personnel and training (DoPT) told TOI on Saturday, "Khedkar has been discharged from IAS with immediate effect through an order passed on Sept 6 under Rule 12 of the IAS (Probation) Rules, 1954. A copy of the order has been emailed to her and has also been sent to her residential address."The Rule 12 allows the central govt to discharge probationers from service if they fail to pass the re-examination or if the central govt is satisfied that the probationer is ineligible for recruitment to the service or is unsuitable for being a member of the services, among others."Taking note of the findings and conclusions of a single-member probe panel report, the govt proceeded for a summary enquiry according to the provisions of Rule 12 of the IAS (Probation) Rules, 1954, including giving Khedkar a reasonable opportunity," the officer said."It was seen from the enquiry that Khedkar, IAS Probationer (MH:2023), was ineligible to be a candidate at the Civil Services Exam (CSE)-2022, which was the year of her selection and appointment to the IAS. Therefore, she was ineligible to be recruited to the IAS," the officer said.TOI made repeated attempts to call Puja Khedkar and her father Dilip Khedkar, a retired Maharashtra govt officer, on Saturday to seek their comments on the development, but their phones were switched off. They did not respond to TOI's messages till the time of going to press.The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) had cancelled Khedkar's provisional candidature of the CSE-2022 and debarred her from all the future exams/selections of the commission on July 31 This was after she failed to respond to the commission's show cause notice of July 18 for "fraudulently availing attempts beyond the permissible limit provided for in the CSE Rules, by faking her identity".The central govt, too, had constituted a single-member panel to verify Khedkar's candidature claims and other details based on a report filed by the Maharashtra govt. The panel submitted its report to the DoPT secretary on July 24. The DoPT's order discharging Khedkar is an outcome of this exercise.Khedkar denied all the allegations in her anticipatory bail plea, pending before the Delhi high court, after the UPSC on July 19 lodged a criminal complaint with the Delhi police accusing her of "forging identity papers, misrepresenting and falsifying facts to obtain extra attempts in the CSE-2022, beyond the prescribed limit".The Delhi high court on Sept 5 extended Khedkar's interim protection from arrest till Sept 26, recording that the police had sought 10 more days for further investigation. Khedkar had then told the court that she was willing to get herself medically examined at AIIMS, after the Delhi Police claimed that one of her disability certificates might be "forged" and "fabricated".The DoPT officer said Khedkar had applied and appeared for the CSE between 2012 and 2023. Her application forms for these exams revealed that she availed more attempts at the CSE than the maximum permissible number of nine in her claimed category (OBC and PwBD), he said. Rule 3 of the CSE Rules 2022 prescribed the maximum number of attempts permissible to a candidate belonging to various categories.HL: THE CONTROVERSYPuja Khedkar, an IAS 2023 batch officer, had joined the Pune district collector's office as an assistant collector on probation on June 3. She was transferred to Washim on July 8, following district collector Suhas Divase's report to the state chief secretary regarding her unreasonable demands of privileges that are not allowed to an IAS probationer, besides highhanded behaviour with staffers at the collectorate, use of red and blue beacon light on a private Audi car and usurping an additional collector's chamber.Later, her OBC non-creamy layer and disability claims made at the time of appearing in the UPSC exam were questioned.