UP bungalow row: Mulayam Singh, Akhilesh Yadav withdraw plea from Supreme Court
Samajwadi Party patron Mulayam Singh Yadav and his son and former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Akhilesh Yadav on Thursday withdrew their petitions from the Supreme Court in which they had sought relief over vacating the government bungalows.
On May 7, the apex court had struck down an amendment in a state legislation allowing former chief ministers to retain government accommodation even after demitting office. ” A chief minister was at par with a common man once his or her term ends,” a bench headed by Justice Ranjan Gogoi had said adding that it had the effect of creating a separate class of citizens for conferment of benefits by way of distribution of public property on the basis of the previous public office held by them.
On the backdrop of this, the former UP CMs had moved the Supreme Court seeking “appropriate time” for vacating their official residences allocated by the state government during their tenure.
While Akhilesh had requested the court to “grant” him “sufficient time to make arrangements for suitable alternative accommodation, taking into consideration the security of the petitioner and his family members”, His father had sought relief citing the “security of the petitioner, age and ill-health”.
However, on June 2, the father-son duo vacated their respective official residences complying with the Supreme Court deadline. It was also reported that the bungalow vacated by Akhilesh Yadav was left in a poor state with missing water taps, decorative plants, lights, bathroom fittings, electrical fittings; damaged swimming pool, cycle track, and kitchen and broken tiles, which had triggered a war of words between the BJP and the SP leaders.
Besides these two, Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Rajasthan Governor Kalyan Singh, BSP chief Mayawati and Congress leader ND Tiwari are among the six former chief ministers who were asked by the estate department to vacate the bungalows in pursuance of the apex court’s order.
