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The PIL plea claims that the appointment list of State Law Officers was made on the recommendation of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and several Advocates who hold different positions in RSS have been appointed.
The Allahabad High Court has sought counter affidavit/affidavit by the State Government of Uttar Pradesh in the Public Interest Litigation (PIL) plea challenging the recent engagement of state law officers in the High Court.
Stressing that transparency, fairness and objectivity are the hallmarks of the present day administration, the bench of Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Shree Prakash Singh has directed the counter affidavit/affidavit of the State to be sworn in by the Principal Secretary, Law/ Legal Remembrancer himself.
Court has further directed that the affidavit shall touch upon all the aspects of the selection and appointment of the Government Advocates including assessment of need, eligibility, equal opportunity, process of selection and all other related and auxiliary aspects.
"The Court shares the concern of the petitioners that entire process should be more transparent and objective. While filing the affidavit, the endeavour of the State Government, in our opinion, should be to ensure that the process to be evolved henceforth does not lack transparency and objectivity," Court added.
The affidavit has been directed to be filed within a period of six weeks and the petitioner has been asked to file rejoinder affidavit by the next date of listing. The matter will be next heard on October 10, 2022.
Passing the order, Court observed that despite Supreme Court directions regarding the selection of government lawyers having been in place [State of Punjab and another vs. Brijeshwar Singh Chahal and another reported in (2016)] , the State Government failed to take any step to evolve a policy to make the system of selection and appointment of the State Law Officers more transparent, fair and objective.
Court said, "More than six and half years have elapsed since then, however, no concrete steps appear to be in sight which the State Government might have taken to reform the system of selection and appointment of the State Law Officers".
Regarding state counsel's submission that for making recommendations for appointment as State Law Officers, the State Government constituted a Committee comprising of three high level officers of the State Government and the appointments which are under challege were made only upon the recommendation of the said committee, Court said,
"Appointing a Committee as one-time measure for making recommendations for selection and appointment of the State Law Officers does not, in our considered opinion, appear to constitute any meaningful and concrete step to comply with the judgment and order passed by Hon’ble Supreme Court in the case of Brijeshwar Singh Chahal (supra). Hon’ble Supreme Court has clearly directed for taking concrete steps for reforming the system so that it is made more transparent, fair and objective."
Court opined that in compliance of the judgment of the top court, the State Government was/is expected to evolve a system/policy.
The present PIL plea has been filed before the Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court against the recent engagement of state law officers in the High Court. The plea alleges that the said list was prepared by the Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh, and only the members of the R.S.S./ Officer Bearers have been appointed.
Three Lawyers of the high court, Advocates Rama Shankar Tiwari, Shashank Kumar Shukla and Arvind Kumar have moved the high court contending that the present list has been published in utter violation of the guidelines issued by the top court.
"Neither any application has been invited nor any committee has been constituted and from the back door State Law Officers and Brief Holders ( Civil and Criminal ) have been appointed in an illegal and arbitrary manner," the plea read.
Case Title: Rama Shankar Tiwari and 2 Ors v. State of UP and Ors.
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