There was not victimisation of employee, clarifies GAIL

New Delhi, July 20 (UNI) Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL) today clarified that there has been no victimisation of one of their top ranking officer as reported by a television channel recently.

GAIL has said the person Mr S P Rao, who is the Director Projects and a member of the Board of Directors of GAIL (India) Limited had applied for the post of CEO of a private company.

As per the Board approved rules of employment of GAIL, all applications from company employees for employment outside the Company are required to be forwarded through the proper channel.

However, the rules of GAIL provide for withholding of application for outside employment where there are compelling grounds of interest of the Company.

At the time of applying for the post of CEO of the private company, Mr Rao was directly responsible for the completion of five on-going time-critical grass-root projects involving Rs 2,600 crore of investment.

Among them, of prime importance is the much delayed Dahej-Uran.

Pipeline project (DUPL) of GAIL, which is intended to carry natural gas to Maharashtra in March 2007 and provide relief from the severe power crisis the State suffers every summer. Accordingly, the application of Mr Rao for the post of CEO of the private company was not forwarded by the GAIL management.

According to GAIL, the case of Mr Rao is not an isolated one.

Since 1997, more than twenty applications of senior executives for outside employment were not forwarded for various reasons such as business requirements of the company, not meeting the eligibility criteria and so on. In majority of the cases the applicants did not attend the interviews.

Notwithstanding the decision of the GAIL Management, Mr Rao had directly applied to the recruitment consultants and passed through a two stage selection process in the private Company. In the final stage, a high level Search Committee selected an internal candidate for the post of CEO and this selection was ratified by the Board of the private company.

''In other words, Shri Rao was not denied an opportunity to compete,'' GAIL said.

On the 5th of September, 2005, Mr Rao filed a Writ Petition in the Delhi High Court. At this point in time the whole matter is sub-judice.

UNI RT RL DB1807