On December 27, the Allahabad High Court's division bench ordered the State Election Commission to notify the urban local body elections sans OBC reservations as soon as possible. According to the court, the state administration does not adhere to the Triple Test Formality as established by the Apex Court. 

A reservation for women in accordance with constitutional norms was also directed by the Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya and Justice Saurabh Lavania bench in the poll notification.

" While notifying the elections the seats and offices of Chairpersons, except those to be reserved for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, shall be notified as for general/open category. The notification to be issued for elections shall include the reservation for women in terms of the constitutional provisions," the Court directed.

Notably, the state has been ordered to take into account the claim of transgender people for their inclusion among the Backward Class of Citizens once a dedicated Commission is established for undertaking the exercise of conducting the empirical study as to the nature and implications of Backwardness for the purposes of providing the Backward Class of Citizens with reservations in the context of elections to the urban local bodies.

With this decision, the bench nullified the draught notification that the Uttar Pradesh government had released on December 5 announcing its intention to hold urban local body elections after reserving four mayor seats for Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in the state despite their failure to comply with the "triple test" requirements established by the Top Court in the case of Vikas Kishanrao Gawali v. State of Maharashtra & Ors. LL 2021 SC 13 to determine the political back 

It should be emphasised that the court's ruling was based on several arguments opposing the government's draught notification that would have provided for an OBC quota in the elections without complying with the triple test formality.

As background, the Apex Court had remarked in the Vikas Kishanrao Gawali case that a triple test had to be undertaken before providing quota for the OBC category. In the aforementioned triple test, 

(1) establishing a dedicated Commission to carry out an immediate, rigorous empirical investigation into the causes and effects of the state's local bodies' backwardness; 

(2) defining the percentage of reservations that must be made locally, taking into account the Commission's recommendations, in order to avoid becoming overbroad; and 

(3) A combined total of no more than 50% of the seats allotted to SC, ST, and OBCs combined.

The Allahabad High Court remarked that the UP Government had not established a special commission to conduct a current, rigorous empirical investigation into the causes and effects of the backwardness qua local bodies and that, in the absence of such information, the provision of OBC quota was invalid.

" 8.43 It is not a case where the State has set up the dedicated Commission for conducting the empirical study into the nature and implications of backwardness for the purposes of providing Page No.82 reservation to Backward Class of citizens in the local selfgovernment institutions and thereafter made necessary changes in the statutory prescriptions. Thus, the State has completely failed to comply with the dictum and directions of Hon'ble Supreme Court in the judgments contained in K. Krishna Murthy (supra) and Vikas Kishanrao Gawali (supra)," the Court remarked (emphasis supplied)

The Supreme Court ordered governments to review their policies, particularly legislative measures pertaining to reservations in local self-government organisations, and the Court emphasised that the State cannot be allowed to ignore this order.

" Accordingly, State of Uttar Pradesh was under an obligation to re-frame its policy including by way of having a fresh look at its Legislative prescriptions in tune with the law declared by the Constitution Bench of Hon'ble Supreme Court in the case of K. Krishna Murthi (supra) and also in the case of Vikas Kishanrao Gawai (supra). The State has, however, failed to re-frame its policies according to the mandate of Hon'ble Supreme Court even after a lapse of a period of 12 years hence the plea that the petitioners are not entitled to the relief as claimed in these writ petitions as there is no challenge to the State enactments, is not tenable," the Court ruled.
As a result, the Court gave the following instructions in its order. 

(A) The Uttar Pradesh government's notification from the Department of Urban Development, dated 5/12/2022, is thus revoked in accordance with section 9-A (5)(3). 

(B) The State Government order dated 12.12.2022, which mandates that Executive Officers and the Senior Most Officer in the Uttar Pradesh Palika Centralized Service (Accounts Cadre) sign off on municipal bank accounts, is likewise revoked by this order.

(C) It is further ordered that no reservations for members of the Backward Class of citizens shall be made until the State Government has fully complied with the triple test/conditions imposed by the Supreme Court in the cases of K. Krishna Murthy (above) and Vikas Kishanrao Gawali. 

(D) In the event that a Municipal Body's term is about to expire, a three-member committee headed by the relevant District Magistrate, of which the Executive Officer/Chief Executive Officer/Municipal Commissioner shall be a member, shall conduct the affairs of such Municipal Body until the formation of the elected Body. A District Level Officer, to be chosen by the District Magistrate, will serve as the third member. However, the aforementioned Committee shall simply carry out routine duties for the relevant Municipal Body and shall not make any significant policy decisions. According to Article 243-U of the Indian Constitution, which stipulates that elections to establish a municipality must be concluded before their length has expired, we have given the order to notify the polls promptly. We recognise that the dedicated Commission's duty of gathering and compiling materials is enormous and time-consuming, but the establishment of elected municipal bodies through elections cannot be postponed according to the constitutional requirement set forth in Article 243-U of the Indian Constitution. We also order that the claim of transgender people to be included in the Backward Class of Citizens be taken into consideration once the dedicated Commission is established to carry out the exercise of conducting empirical study as to the nature and implications of Backwardness for the purposes of providing reservation to Backward Class of Citizens in the context of elections to the urban local bodies.

Case title: Vaibhav Pandey vs. State Of U.P. Thru. Prin. Secy. Deptt. Urban along with connected matters
Citation: PUBLIC INTEREST LITIGATION (PIL) No. 878 of 2022
Link: https://elegalix.allahabadhighcourt.in/elegalix/WebDownloadJudgmentDocument.do?judgmentID=10118386