In another major setback to the Mamata Banerjee, the Calcutta high court on Monday scrapped the monthly allowance of imams and muezzins declaring it unconstitutional and against the public interest. The state government’s attempt to get a stay on the court ruling proved an exercise in futility.
A division bench of Justice P.K. Chatterjee and Justice M.M. Srivastava passed the above ruling on a writ petition filed by the BJP challenging the government decision. On April 9, 2012, the state government had announced that it would pay `2,500 to imams and `1,500 to muezzins every month. For this purpose, the state government allotted `660 crore in its annual budget 2012-13. The government constituted a task force headed by retired judge Md Abdul Ghani to identify the recipients of the allowance. The government’s decision had triggered a major political storm and was slammed by the Opposition.
The state BJP had filed a writ petition in the high court claiming that the government order was discriminatory because the allowance was being given to religious leaders of only one community.
The division bench on Monday ruled that the payment to imams and muezzins violated the Constitution and therefore it should be stopped immediately.
The advocate general and the state government’s lawyer argued that the allowance was being given in public interest. The court rejected this argume-nt.
The government took such a major decision just by issuing a memorandum while the rules dema-nded that it should have issued a proper government order.