More than a year after the post fell vacant in the national capital, Jharkhand High Court’s former judge Harish Chandra Mishra has been appointed as Lokayukta of Delhi for a term of five years.
Lokayukta is empowered to inquire into allegations against public functionaries including the Chief Minister or any minister, MLAs, corporators and other such persons holding highest positions of government bodies. Justice (retd.) Reva Khetrapal had retired as Delhi Lokayukta on December 15 in 2020.
Mishra, who will turn 63 on March 27, was appointed as a judge of the Jharkhand High Court in April 2011 and retired on March 26 last year. Mishra was made Acting Chief Justice of the High Court in August 2019 following the death of the then Acting Chief Justice Prashant Kumar and remained on the post till November 2019.
Two petitions seeking appointment of Lokayukta are pending in the Delhi High Court. The Delhi government on February 24 had told the court it was in the process of appointing a Lokayukta.
BJP leader Ashwani Upadhyay, who is one of the petitioners before the court, had submitted that more than 100 cases against MLAs are pending before the office of Lokayukta. Another petition, which alleged unauthorised construction and encroachment of public land by a BJP corporator, also sought immediate appointment of a Lokayukta in Delhi in January.
Mishra, whose father Justice Vishwanath Mishra was a judge of Patna High Court, was initially an officer of the Bihar Superior Judicial Service. He had joined as an Additional District & Sessions Judge in May 1997. Upon bifurcation of the state in November 2000, he was shifted to Jharkhand Superior Judicial Service.
Between June 2001 and February 2002, he remained Special Judge in Ranchi and tried fodder scam cases. He later became District and Sessions Judge in February 2002 and was finally elevated to the High Court in 2011.
In May 2017, a Jharkhand High Court full bench headed by Justice Mishra held that a regular government employee, even if appointed prior to the age of 18 years, cannot be superannuated before actually attaining the retirement age and in absence of any provision in Jharkhand Service Code prohibiting employment of a person below 18 years of age, such appointment cannot be said to be against the Indian Contract Act and the Majority Act, 1875.
In January 2018, a full bench headed by Justice Mishra in a case filed by Tata Steel Limited upheld the validity of Rules 64-B and 64-C of the Mineral Concession Rules which pertain to charging of royalty on processed coal, and refused to interfere with the demand notices issued to Tata by District Mining Officers in Jharkhand. Tata Steel had argued that it is liable to make the payment of royalty of a lesser amount, but its petition was dismissed.
A Justice Mishra-led bench in September 2020 quashed the Jharkhand government’s 2016 notifications which created 100% reservation in 13 scheduled districts for residents of the same district in appointment of District Cadre-III and Class IV posts for 10 years. The court in the order had also set aside appointment of several teachers who had been appointed on the basis of the local reservation. The decision is currently under challenge before the Supreme Court which has stayed any removal of the teachers.
