Social and Right To Information (RTI)activist Nutan Thakur has filed a Public Interest litigation (PIl) in Allahabad High Court, lucknow Bench as regards territorial jurisdiction of the two Benches of the High Court.
The petition says that the territorial jurisdiction of the two Benches is presently being governed by the United Provinces High Courts Amalgamation Order 1948 which fixed Avadh region as the area of lucknow bench and rest to Allahabad bench.
As per Thakur, this arrangement is completely arbitrary and improper because it has not taken the respective distance of various places from lucknow and Allahabad so that in case of most districts of Western UP, the litigants have to cross lucknow to go to Allahabad. Similarly neighbouring district of Pratapgarh is kept in lucknow
instead of Allahabad Bench. This is completely against the interest of the litigants and adds to their hardships. Hence, she has prayed for quashing of this 1948 Order as being detrimental to litigant’s interests and rearrangement of territorial jurisdiction keeping in view the distance factor as well.