State to pay $60,000 for administrative error

AN administrative error which affected the promotion of a sergeant of police will cost the State in excess of $60,000. Last Wednesday, Justice Ronnie Boodoosingh ordered the State to compensate Sgt Nirmal Ramlal in the sum of $60,000 and pay his legal costs for senior and junior counsel.

The judge also declared that Ramlal had a legitimate expectation of being awarded the correct points in his promotion examination and that his right to equality of treatment by a public authority was breached.

Ramlal took legal action after an administrative error led to him not being promoted on two occasions. He had been acting in the post since 2013 and took the examination but was not placed on two Order of Merits Lists in 2016 and 2017.

Ramlal said he was not awarded the correct marks which delayed his promotion and when an administrative error was identified after the 2016 list was published, and he was placed higher on the revised list, he still was not promoted.

In the first list, Ramlal was placed at position 518 and missed out on two promotion exercises in April and December, 2016. A revised list was published in August 2017, and he was bumped up to position 359, and while he argued he should have been promoted in the first batch, he still was not the second time around because of an injunction which prevented the commissioner from promoting corporals.

He was eventually promoted with retroactive effect from April 22, 2016. However, in his decision, Boodoosingh said had the initial promotion been made, Ramlal would have maintained his seniority. “As a consequence, further acting appointments, opportunities or promotions were not available to him. Therefore, his career advancement was affected,” the judge said.

He held that Ramlal was treated unfairly by the Commissioner of Police and the explanation that an administrative error and the injunction were factors outside the control of the commissioner were not enough to address the unfairness Ramlal faced.

“The claimant should have been awarded the correct points in the first instance and since this was not done, it should have been rectified immediately so that he was placed in the correct position on the initial list,” the judge said.

In ordering compensation to be paid for the breaches to Ramlal’s rights, Boodoosingh declined to award the $250,000 asked for but instead said $60,000 was “appropriate in these circumstances to signal the court’s recognition of the right in question and the need for constitutional rights to be upheld.

“The constitution is our highest law. Citizens of all walks of life must be treated equally. Unequal treatment can result from errors of the kind considered here. Special care must be taken when matters of promotion are concerned. Even administrative errors have real and lasting consequences,” he added.

Ramlal was represented by attorneys Anand Ramlogan,SC, Gerald Ramdeen, Douglas Bayley and Alana Rambaran while Keisha Prosper, Rachael Jacob, Andella Ramroop and Avaria Niles represented the Commissioner of Police and the Attorney General.