Six key commissions in Uttar Pradesh hamstrung by vacancies
LUCKNOW: Six important commissions set up under specific laws for key purposes in Uttar Pradesh have been hamstrung by vacancies in their top echelons for a year or more.
They include the Uttar Pradesh Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, the U.P. Commission for Backward Classes, U.P. State Commission for Women, U.P State Food Commission, U.P. Board for Development of Municipal Financial Resources and Uttar Pradesh Water Management and Regulatory Commission.
Picture this: the office of Uttar Pradesh Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes on the 10th floor at Indira Bhavan in Lucknow wears a deserted look even as it anxiously awaits new appointments to key positions.
At one time, poor complainants could be seen jostling with one another here to file fresh complaints about their harassment. Back then, the commission had a chairman, two vicechairpersons and 25 members hearing pending petitions to dispense justice to the aggrieved.
Set up in August 1994, the commission is one of the most important and effective statutory bodies. Though the government gave additional charge of SC-ST commission chairman to the minister of state for social welfare Asim Arun in July, the positions of two vice-chairpersons, 25 members and one secretary have been vacant for close to a year.
“Despite vacancies in the commission, we are trying our best to dispose (of) as many complaints as possible, trying to provide relief to the aggrieved persons,” Sonal Agrawal, the judicial officer, said. Belonging to the 2018 batch of the PCS (J), she has some powers delegated from the acting chairman to hear grievances.
Then, there is the Commission for Other Backward Classes.
The commission’s chairman Jaswant Singh Saini was made a minister in the Yogi Adityanath government 2.0 in March and the position has been vacant since. The two positions of vicechairperson and 25 members are also vacant. The commission went without a chairman for almost two years earlier too when the then incumbent Phagu Chauhan was appointed Bihar governor in July 2019. The government filled the vacancy only in June 2021 a few months before the assembly polls.
This commission was constituted in September 1993 to examine requests for the inclusion of any class of citizens as a backward class.
“The situation of the OBC commission is even worse. The SC-ST commission at least has an acting chairman and the law officer to dispose some complaints. But here there is nobody to take care of petitioners. Secretary Archana Geharwar, who is leading at least five commissions as secretary, has no power to hear cases,” an OBC commission official said.
The Gomti Nagar office of the State Food Commission has virtually remained locked for nearly two years. The then chairman Nand Kishore Yadav, who was appointed during the Samajwadi Party (SP) regime, quit after completing the term amid a controversy after the Yogi Adityanath government seized all his financial and administrative powers in October 2020.
“The law mandates the government to appoint a chairman,
five members and one membersecretary in the food commission but the commission has been virtually non-existent for two years though the government is learnt to have begun the process for fresh appointments,” former commission member Ismail Khan said.
The State Food Commission was set up in 2015 under the provisions of the National Food Security Act 2013 to look into complaints about beneficiaries not getting their due ration under the public distribution system (PDS).
The State Commission for Women is being taken care of by a member-secretary in the absence of the chairperson and 25 members. The commission came into being in 2002.
The U.P. Board of Development Municipal Finacial Resources has been waiting for its new chairman since November 2021 when a retired IAS officer Rakesh Garg completed his term. Today, all the sanctioned posts of four members and one chairman are vacant. The Board was constituted in 2011 in compliance with the 13th Central Finance Commission’s recommendations chiefly to augment local urban bodies’ existing revenue sources and create new ones.
The U.P. Water Management and Regulatory Commission (UPWMRC) has been defunct most of the time since its inception in March 2014. The commission was set up to regulate and recommend, among other things the tariff for water.
It took four years for the commission to get its first chairman in 2018. He also demitted office after completing his extended term on March 31, 2021 having ploughed a lonely furrow for around two-and-a-half years with no other member, the member-secretary or any other regular staff to assist him. The post remains vacant since.
A commission staffer said that the government had advertised the vacancy of the chairman quite a few times since March 2021 but had not received enough applications to make a choice.
“Last time, a lone application was received from the then chairman who completed his term on March 31, 2021,” he said. BJP state president Bhupendra Singh Chaudhary said there were no specific reasons for the posts in some commissions being vacant.
“The process to fill vacant posts of chairpersons and members in various commissions is already on and all vacancies will be filed soon,” he said when contacted.