Uttarakhand HC’s two judge bench, one chief justice Vipin Sanghi and another justice Rakesh Thapliyal directs UK government to appoint Lokayukta within 8 weeks !
Sounds, astonishing and shocking that a proposal for concrete Lokpal in Uttarakhand was drafted during tenure of the then chief minister retired major general Bhuvan Chandra Khanduri who was even praised by the crusader against corruption and architect of Lokpal revolution in the country Anna Hazare. The then CM of Uttarakhand Khanduri during his tenure from 2007 to 2009 and 2011 and 2012 had publicly pledged to implement Lokpal in Uttarakhand and got it unanimously passed in its assembly but after 2013 when the then Lokayukta Justice MM Ghildiyal’s tenure ended – for ten long years the state was without a Lokayukt.
After the Lokayukt office going vacant during the last ten years about 970 complaints have been acknowledged.
Unfortunately , the Lokpal office is being run at Dehradun, the state’s capital without a Lokayukta in which a staggering budget of Rs 30 crores have been spent as per a report of Amar Ujala.
Even in the year 2017 the saffron party government had promised to the electorates of the state before and during the elections’ campaigning to appoint a Lokayukt but after winning the state assembly elections in 2022 till date, after six years there is no talk of installing a Lokpal, though the state government has definitely exhibited interest in implementing the UCC expeditiously with its committee under the chairmanship of (Rtd) justice Ranjana Desai with senior bureaucrats as its members holding a “people’s interaction” event in Delhi’s Constitution Club – seeking their varied responses, many of them positive allegedly from the saffron party members present there as some news reports reveal.
Meanwhile hearing a public interest litigation on Lokayukt – the two judge bench of Uttarakhand High Court comprising of the Chief justice Vipin Sanghi and justice Rakesh Thapliyal in their order directed the Uttarakhand government to install the Lokayukt within 8 weeks from now.
The secretary to chief minister of Uttarakhand Mr. Shailesh Bagauli, while responding to media query had said yesterday that he hasn’t received any directive from the HC. We will read it after we receive it and act accordingly.
It may be recalled that the Uttarakhand Lokayukta Bill was first passed by Uttarakhand assembly in 2011 unanimously with the then Uttarakhand CM Khanduri saying that the Lokayukta will go a long way fighting corruption. After coming to power Khanduri had vowed to implement it within two months n did the needful but after 2013, when the term of Justice Ghildiyal expired as it’s second Lokayukta, no one was appointed till date and the high court has to intervene after a PIL was filed in this regard in Uttarakhand High Court.
According to the said news report – in total since the day one of Lokayukt appointment till June 2022 there had been receipts of 8535 complaints out if which 6920 were disposed off in the absence of a Lokayukt.
