Fill 1.5L vacant police posts by 2021: SC to UP

The Supreme Court on Monday directed Uttar Pradesh government to fill over 1.5 lakh police vacancies in the state in fours years, saying filling up of the posts will help in dealing with the law and order problem.

It also directed the governments of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka to fill up about 45,000 such vacancies in a time- bound manner, while expressing dissatisfaction with the responses of West Bengal, Bihar and Jharkhand in the matter.

The apex court directed the UP government to start filling up the currently 1,01,619 vacant posts in the police and asked the state government to start recruiting 30,000 constables every year from August 17 till August 2020, apart from filling up of 11,376 posts of Sub-Inspector.

It directed that 3,200 posts of Sub-Inspector should be filled annually from January 2018 till January 2021, apart from filling up the promotional posts every year.

The apex court also accepted the roadmaps of filling up of police vacancies in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka and asked them to complete the process of recruitment in a time-bound manner.

"If police vacancies are filled up, it will help in dealing with several law and order problems. You need to fill up the vacancies and do the recruitment in time-bound manner," a bench of Chief Justice J S Khehar and Justice D Y Chandrachud said.

The bench accepted the roadmap given by the three states to fill up the vacancies and sought similar fresh road maps from Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal.