Local Body Polls: Allahabad High Court Directs UP Govt To Submit OBC Commission Report

The Allahabad High Court has directed the Uttar Pradesh government to present before it the report prepared by the dedicated Uttar Pradesh Backward Classes Commission to study the representation of Other Backward Class (OBCs) in urban local bodies.

It may be noted that the commission had the primary responsibility to collect empirical data on the political backwardness of the community and to look into the issue of reservation to Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in urban local body elections.

A bench of Justice Rajan Roy and Justice Manish Kumar passed this order on a writ petition filed by one Vikas Agrawal challenging a government notification issued on March 30, 2023, regarding the reservation to Nighasan Nagar Panchayat.

It is important to note that the report of the Commission was submitted to the UP govt last month. Subsequently, the UP govt informed the Supreme Court that the report has been accepted by the UP Cabinet.

Thereafter, the Apex Court, on Monday (March 27) permitted notifications for setting up the election process for the local bodies in the State of Uttar Pradesh with OBC quota within two days. It allowed the State Election Commission to issue a notification in this regard in two days with an OBC quota in terms of a report of the Uttar Pradesh Backward Classes Commission.

Subsequently, the Urban Local Body polls were notified on March 30, 2023, wherein the reserved constituencies for the purposes of elections to the local bodies were also notified. The Government sought objections from the aggrieved person by April 6.

Now, the case of the petitioner is that the report of the commission is not in the public domain making it impossible for him to file his objections to same. Therefore, he moved the High Court seeking certain reliefs in the matter.

Having heard his advocate Gaurav Mehrotra as well as Additional Advocate General K P Tripathi, the High Court directed the State Government to submit the rpeort before the HC by Thursday.

In related news, on 4 January 2023, the Supreme Court had stayed the Allahabad High Court's direction to the Uttar Pradesh State Election Commission to notify the Urban Local Body Polls without OBC reservation. The bench noted that in view of the decision of the Constitution bench in Dr K Krishna Murthy v. Union of India (2010) and of the three-judge bench in Vikas Kishanrao Gawali v. State of Maharashtra (2021), the government of Uttar Pradesh had issued notification dated 28 December 2022 constituting the Uttar Pradesh State local bodies dedicated backward classes Commission.