LUCKNOW: In a major setback to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court on Monday set aside the dismissal of 22,000 policemen recruited during the previous Samajwadi Party regime headed by Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Justice D.P. Singh, while squashing the UP government's order on a writ petition filed by the dismissed policemen, questioned the rationale of scrapping the entire recruitment.
The Mayawati government, soon after coming to power in May last year, had instituted a probe into the recruitments alleging irregularities.
Justice Singh in his order stated that none of the 22,000 policemen were served notices, were not called during the probe and were not given an opportunity to be heard prior to the cancellation of their appointment. The judge further stated that the government should have undertaken exercise to check everything as the decision affected the future of the dismissed policemen and their families.
Taking the Mayawati government to task, the court said that both the state government and the state director general of police had acted without application of mind relating to the dismissal of such a large number of policemen in one stroke. "They acted in whimsical, irresponsible and dictatorial manner," he observed.
Avtar Singh, a leader of the dismissed policemen, said that Mayawati had acted in revenge to settle scores with her rival Mulayam Singh Yadav.
"In the process she created a world record. She should enter the Guinness Book of World Records, as no where in the world such a vast number of policemen have been sacked at one go," he added.
