Vice Admiral Bimal Verma, the top Navy officer superseded by the government to appoint his junior Vice Admiral Karambir Singh as the next navy chief, has petitioned the Armed Forces Tribunal against the order.

The senior Navy officer, who heads the Andaman and Nicobar Command in Port Blair, will be represented by his daughter Rhea Verma, a Delhi-based lawyer.

The tribunal is expected to hear the plea on Tuesday.

Her father, Vice Admiral Bimal Verma, would have been the senior-most officer in the Navy on May 31 when Admiral Sunil Lanba retires. But the government last month decided against appointing him and opted for Vice Admiral Karambir Singh.

Vice Admiral Karambir Singh currently heads the Visakhapatnam-based Eastern Naval Command.

While the seniority principle is usually followed when a new service chief is named, there have been instances when the government has overlooked it.

For instance when General Bipin Rawat was named army chief in December 2016, the National Democratic Alliance government did supersede two lieutenant generals who were senior to Rawat.

The previous United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government also did not go by the seniority principle in 2014 when Admiral Robin Dhowan superseded a senior officer to become the navy chief.

Then-defence minister Manohar Parrikar had famously defended the government’s choice, arguing that if seniority was the only criterion guiding the government in its choice, then the computer could have selected a service chief on the basis of date of birth.

First Published: Apr 08, 2019 17:15 IST