Uttarakhand: Sword hanging on all the recruitments after the formation of the state in the assembly, legal opinion being taken

The sword hangs over all the recruitments made after the formation of the state in the Uttarakhand Legislative Assembly. The expert committee constituted to investigate the matter has not been given a clean chit to the recruitments made by following the rules. According to the committee’s inquiry report, 170 employees were appointed on ad-hoc basis during the tenure of different Assembly Speakers from 2000 to 2012. These employees were regularised. The committee has recommended to take legal opinion on these recruitments.

Speaker Ritu Khanduri Bhushan, on the report of the expert committee constituted to examine the Vidhan Sabha recruitments, decided to cancel 228 appointments on ad-hoc basis from 2016 to 2022 and 22 through Upanal. This includes 150 appointments for the tenure of the then Speaker Govind Singh Kunjwal in the Congress government in 2016 and 6 for the tenure of Speaker Premchand Agarwal in the BJP government in 2020 and 72 in 2021.

The inquiry committee scrutinized all the recruitments made in the Vidhan Sabha since the formation of the state till 2022, which found that all the recruitments were done without processing despite the moratorium on ad-hoc appointments. 170 employees appointed before 2012 have been regularized, while their appointments were also done like the canceled recruitments.

Based on the inquiry report of the committee, it was decided to cancel the appointments made against the rules. The Chief Minister has also immediately approved the canceled appointments. The employees were regularized in the appointments made before 2012, due to which legal opinion is being taken on these appointments.

Ritu Khanduri Bhushan, Speaker of the Assembly