IRS officer Rahul Navin appointed ED Acting Director in place of Sanjay Kumar Mishra

The Centre has appointed special director Rahul Navin as in-charge director of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) till the new regular director is selected, an official order said on Friday. Navin, a 1993-batch IRS officer, will be taking over the charge as the acting director of the ED from Sanjay Kumar Mishra, an IRS officer of the 1984 batch.  He is currently working as Special Director-Chief Vigilance Officer (ED headquarters).

In an order, issued on Friday, Joint Secretary (Ministry of Finance) Ritvik Pandey said, “The President is pleased to order the cessation of tenure of Sanjay Kumar Mishra, IRS-84 batch as Director of Enforcement in the Enforcement Directorate and placing Rahul Navin, Special Director (ED) as in-charge Director-ED till appointment of a regular Director or until further orders, whichever is earlier.”

The Centre had approached the Supreme Court seeking a tenure extension for Mishra till October 15. Prior to this, the apex court had declared the two tenure extensions granted to Mishra beyond September 8, 2021 as “not valid in law”.

During the hearing, the top court questioned the Centre for seeking an extension for the officer and asked if the entire department was "full of incompetent people" except for its incumbent chief.

"Are we not giving a picture that there is no other competent person and the entire department is full of incompetent people? Is it not demoralising for the department that it cannot function if this person is not there" the bench had told Solicitor General Tushar Mehta.

The top law officer argued that continuity in the ED leadership was necessary in view of the peer review by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global anti-money laundering and terror financing watchdog, whose rating matters. Mehta said Mishra was "not indispensable" but his presence was necessary for the entire exercise.

Following this in July, the Supreme Court then allowed Mishra to continue as the Director-ED till September 15, instead of the earlier July 31 deadline. A bench of Justices B R Gavai, Vikram Nath and Sanjay Karol said it was granting the extension in “larger public and national interest” but that Mishra would cease to remain ED chief from the midnight of September 15.

Mishra was first appointed interim director of the ED for three months in October 2018. In November same year, he was made the full-time chief for a two-year fixed tenure.

Following the procedure, Mishra's tenure was coming to an end in 2020, when the Centre quietly extended it with retrospective effect, making it a three-year tenure against the initial two years.

Notably, by this time Mishra had attained superannuation in the interregnum.

This was challenged before the SC, which ruled in 2021 that there should not be any further extension to him. This prompted the Centre to bring in an Ordinance for his continuation at the post.