The DMK today moved the Madras High Court against a recent order of the Tamil Nadu government appointing Mohan Pyare as the state vigilance commissioner, alleging that it aimed at making infructuous its pending petition on the methodology of selection for the post. The petition, filed by DMK organising secretary R S Bharathi, submitted that the state government by its January 8 order, had replaced V K Jayakodi with Mohan Pyare. Bharathi submitted that his earlier petition was not only against the person, but also against the method of appointment and the selection process adopted by the government and the governor's secretariat. The appointment was nothing but an attempt to make his earlier writ petition infructuous and with an intention to nullify the order to be passed by the court, he said. Bharathi submitted that the state government in the recent past has been nominating the chief secretary or officers in the rank of additional chief secretary as state vigilance commissioner. "The effect of such a nomination is that the entire State Vigilance Commission has lost its character as an independent, objective and transparent autonomous body and has become a wing of the state government, thereby defeating the very purpose of its constitution," he said. If the State Vigilance Commission was really to be an objective, impartial and autonomous body to check corruption in administration, the Vigilance Commissioner cannot be the chief secretary or any other secretary to government, he said. The person selected must be an independent officer appointed specially to the post with a secured tenure as done in the case of CBI Director or Central Vigilance Commission. Senior Counsel P Wilson, representing Bharathi, submitted that government's move in appointing Jayakodi as commissioner of the Vigilance Commission was "arbitrary, illegal and unreasonable" as he was a junior in rank to several officers, including the chief secretary. "Therefore he will not be able to investigate any accusation of high-level corruption against either the chief secretary or other secretaries senior to him," Wilson stated. His interim prayer was to stay its operation.
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