HC questions Lucknow Nagar Nigam over recruitments during past year

Lucknow: The Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court on Wednesday took a dig at the hundreds of recruitment in the Lucknow Nagar Nigam (Municipal Corporation) over the past one year, asking how the recruitments were done without taking permission from the finance department.

Reacting over a petition filed by Rajesh Kumar, the HC bench, comprising Justice AP Shahi and Justice Sanjay Harkauli, sought clarification from the department over the same. The bench asked, "Why did the department recruit hundreds of employees when they had lack of funds for dispensing salaries of the staffers?"

It may be mentioned that in April 2016, the Lucknow Nagar Nigam had no funds to distribute salaries of the staff, thus they took loan from the state government on condition that they will not do any further recruitment without the permission from the finance department, which dispenses salaries of the staff.

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According to the government's directive dated December 13, 2016, the department was bounds to pay the salaries and gratuities of the staffers from the loan. But overlooking the directive, the Lucknow Nagar Nigam, from January 4, 2017 to January 7, 2017, recruited hundreds of new staff members that included clerks, stenos, junior engineers and assistant engineers.

The court has asked the Nagar Nigam to submit the affidavit with clarification for violating the government order within a week.