Showing concern over acute shortage of members of law enforcing agencies in the State, senior IPS officer, Amitabh Thakur, sought to discontinue the ceremonial Guard of Honour accorded to Ministers, top police and administrative officers. He sent a letter in this regard to Chief Secretary Alok Ranjan requesting him to immediately act on his appeal as it would also help to have more force members to maintain peace.
“An IG and senior officers are given Guard of Honour by one sub-inspector, two head constables and eight constables while others are given such honour by one head constable and four constables. It’s a colonial tradition,” Amitabh Thakur, posted as IG, Civil Defence asserted in his letter. The Guard of Honour for a visiting VVIP is a tradition handed down by the British. The honour was reserved then for Governor Generals and Viceroys.
Thakur claimed that the tradition started when the number of senior officers were few, while at present, the number of officers and political post-holders have increased massively. Some of these Ministers are of “definite criminal background” and giving them such honour hits the morale of police force and sends a wrong signal to the public, he added. Thakur said that the State Government should follow the steps of the Maharashtra Government, which recently abolished this tradition. This step will save the resources in the staff-crunched state police force, he added.
Meanwhile, Amitabh and his wife Nutan Thakur, had also claimed to have challenged ‘Holiday politics’ of the State Government. In the petition filed in the lucknow Bench of Allahabad High Court, they are said to have stated that the State Government declares ‘public holidays’ under Section 25 of Negotiable Instruments Act but, for the last few years such holidays are being declared in a completely arbitrary manner solely for political considerations.
They claimed that the previous Mayawati Government declared public holiday on the birth and death anniversary of Kansi Ram which was changed by Akhilesh Yadav Government to birth anniversaries of Chandrashekhar, Karpuri Thakur and Charan Singh.
The petition further says that these arbitrary declarations of holidays are badly affecting governance and hence need to be regulated immediately. They said to have prayed for framing of a definite holiday policy and end the practice of declaring public holidays in name of political reasons, solely on caste or religious considerations.