The Uttar Pradesh government on Thursday while on one hand took action against a corrupt IAS officer on the directive of the high court, on the other hand it brought back tainted SP leader Vinod Kumar Singh alias Pandit Singh as minister.
The Allahabad high court dealt a severe shock to the Akhilesh Yadav government ordering it to remove Noida chairman Rakesh Bahadur with immediate effect. The government complied immediately, placing the IAS officer, known for his proximity to SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav, in waiting.
The bench comprising justices LK Mahapatra and PKS Baghel dismissed the government’s review petition which prayed for reviewing the court’s order of November 8 last year in which the court had ordered removal of two IAS officers Rakesh Bahadur and Sanjiv Saran (CEO, Noida) from their posts as they were involved in corruption cases.
The court has also directed the CBI to conduct an inquiry into the charges against the two officers and submit its report by March 31. The two officers had been given the same posts once again even though they were facing serious corruption charges relating to land allotments during their previous tenure on these very posts. The allotments pertain to the period when Mulayam was chief minister between 2003 and 2007.
Meanwhile, Akhilesh Yadav inducted 12 new ministers, including Vinod Kumar Singh who was dropped after he allegedly abducted and beat up the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) in Gonda. Pandit Singh was dropped from the ministry in October last year after he abducted and manhandled Gonda CMO SP Singh. Questioned on this count after the swearing-in ceremony, Akhilesh Yadav told reporters that the charges had not been proved.
