The administrative machinery of the State has, over successive regimes, been susceptible to deep political penetration, the Court said.
It flagged that transfers, postings, and promotions of officers in UP are instruments of political patronage rather than merit-based governance.
“The vertical loyalty of officers runs not toward the Constitution but toward the ruling dispensation.
Field officers, acutely conscious of the transfer-posting economy, calibrate their conduct to satisfy political superiors.
Encounter killings, selective crackdowns, and targeted use of the Gangsters Act against inconvenient individuals have periodically attracted judicial notice,” the Court added.
In a judgment highly critical of the functioning of UP police, Justice Vinod Diwakar said that Uttar Pradesh’s "feudal mindset of politicians and bureaucrats” has long reduced constitutional governance to an instrument of personal dominion rather than public service.
The administrative machinery of the State has, over successive regimes, been susceptible to deep political penetration, the Court said. It flagged that transfers, postings, and promotions of officers in UP are instruments of political patronage rather than merit-based governance.
Officers perceived as loyalists are rewarded with preferred postings - urban commissionerates, lucrative districts - while those demonstrating independence are transferred punitively to inconsequential assignments, a well-known fact, the Bench said.
“The vertical loyalty of officers runs not toward the Constitution but toward the ruling dispensation. Field officers, acutely conscious of the transfer-posting economy, calibrate their conduct to satisfy political superiors. Encounter killings, selective crackdowns, and targeted use of the Gangsters Act against inconvenient individuals have periodically attracted judicial notice,” the Court added.
