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The Allahabad High Court on Monday dismissed a Public Interest Litigation plea with Rs. 1 Lakh cost which was filed seeking direction to the Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to disclose his full and actual name in the public domain & produce all documents thereto. A Direction was also sought to refrain the CM from using the word 'Yogi' as title in his official communication.

The petitioner namely Namah, an alleged Lok Janshakti Party member, had impleaded the CM as 'Adityanath' in this PIL alleging that the CM had been using different names at different places on different occasions and more than 25 crore residents of the Uttar Pradesh want to know his real and correct name.

Dismissing Namah's plea, the division bench of Chief Justice  Rajesh Bindal and Justice Piyush Agrawal noted that in the plea, Namah did not clarify his credentials, and being a political person he deliberately chose to conceal his identity while filing the writ petition, apparently with some ulterior motive or cheap publicity.

Court pointed out that Namaha also tried to mislead the court about his educational qualification. "He claimed that he had been certified to be an illiterate person by the Election Commission of India, a fact which was belied on the face of it from the conduct and presentation of the case by the petitioner. He was arguing his case in English. He was carrying copy of the Constitution of India and could read the same very well," Court noted, 

Therefore, Court held, "We find this petition to be totally misconceived, filed with ulterior motive by a political person, without disclosing his complete credentials and concealing material facts from the Court. Hence, the same is dismissed. To discourage filing of such frivolous petitions, in our opinion, the petitioner deserves to be burdened with cost of ₹1,00,000."

Court directed Namah to deposit the cost amount within 6 weeks at the handicapped ashram, Jawaharlal Nehru Road, Prayagraj.

Namah had claimed that at the time of nomination in the election, CM's name was stated as Adityanath son of Avaidyanath whereas, on the Twitter handle of the State Chief Secretary, CM is addressed as Mahant Yogi Adityanath Ji Maharaj. 

He had further alleged that somewhere CM's name is written as Ajay Singh Bisht and at other places, it is Adityanath Yogi and because of these many names, there remains a state of dilemma among the public regarding his correct name.

Oppsing Namah's arguements, Additional Advocate General Manish Goel, on behalf of the State government, had challenged the validity of his petition. He had contended that as the CM in private capacity had been made a party to the matter, therefore, the PIL being against a private person was not maintainable.

Goel had alleged that the PIL was filed for the purpose of cheap popularity and as the petitioner had not clarified his credentials, therefore, as per the High Court Rules also, the petition was liable to be dismissed with special costs.

Case Title: Namaha v. State of U.P. and others