Annoyed with the lack of consensus among the constitutional authorities in Uttar Pradesh, the Supreme Court on Wednesday invoked its extraordinary powers to assume authority to appoint the State’s Lokayukta.
In a rare display of flexing its extraordinary powers under Article 142 of the Constitution to enforce its own orders in order to do “complete justice”, the Supreme Court for the first time in its history appointed a Lokayukta after slamming the “failure” of the constitutional authorities of the State to comply with its orders.
A Bench, headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi, appointed former high court judge Justice Virendra Singh as Uttar Pradesh’s Lokayukta after expressing its annoyance at how the UP government failed to meet the Supreme Court deadline.
“The failure of constitutional functionaries to comply with the orders of the highest court of the land is deeply regretted and astonishing,” Justice Gogoi observed.
No consensus had been reached among the three-member committee of the Chief Minister, the Opposition Leader and the Chief Justice of the State High Court despite two rounds of talks. A five-hour long midnight meeting of the committee failed, after which talks resumed at the residence of Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav in Lucknow, which also failed to end the freeze.
The committee was supposed to submit the name on Wednesday with the Supreme Court and file a compliance report. The apex court had on Monday given the UP government 48 hours to comply or face “dire consequences”.
The Bench zeroed in on Mr. Justice (retired) Singh after examining a list of five names. It has directed the State government to comply with this order and report back on December 20.
Earlier on December 14, the apex court had rapped the UP government for not appointing Lokayukta in the State despite its directions, saying it seemed that appointing authorities have their “own agenda”.
The bench was hearing the pleas filed by Mahendra Kumar Jain and lawyer Radhakant Tripathi for a direction on appointment of the State’s Lokayukta.
