The High Court has given an important decision on the petition related to OBC Reservation regarding UP Local Urban Body Elections in Uttar Pradesh. Giving a big blow to the state government, the Lucknow bench of the High Court has rejected the draft notification issued on December 5 for the civic elections. Along with this, the court has ordered the state government to conduct the body elections without OBC reservation. This decision has been passed by the division bench of Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyay and Justice Saurabh Lavania together on the petitions filed on this issue.

It so happened that the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court held a hearing on the civic body elections last Saturday and reserved its decision. The court had stayed the issuance of election notification related to the matter. Public interest litigations were filed on behalf of Vaibhav Pandey and others in the bench of Justice Devendra Kumar Upadhyay and Justice Saurabh Lavania.

The petitioners had alleged that the rules have been bypassed in the OBC reservation in the civic elections. On this, the court has put an interim stay on the announcement of election dates till December 27. Senior advocate LP Mishra appeared on behalf of the petitioners. In his arguments, he had said that OBC reservation in urban local bodies is different from reservation in services and educational institutions.

Opposing the petitions, Additional Chief Standing Counsel Amitabh Rai argued in the court that the government had already conducted a survey. The state government also followed the provisions of the Municipalities Act, which provides for OBC reservation in local body elections.