Home minister to visit Lucknow to study law and order situation

Home Minister Indrajit Gupta will visit Lucknow shortly to personally assess the law and order situation in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state.

The situation in UP was discussed at the two-day meeting of the Communist Party of India's national executive meeting over the weekend. The national executive took strong exception to the UP governor and chief secretary publicly contradicting Gupta's statement in Parliament last week.

''It is for them to report to the home minister and sort out the situation by discussing it with him instead of going public and comparing the present situation with the past,'' CPI general secretary A B Bardhan said.

The CPI national executive suggested to Gupta that he convene a meeting of district magistrates and senior civil servants to study the situation.

''It is not enough to make statements on the law and order situation in UP'' Bardhan, who succeeded Gupta as CPI chief, said.

Meanwhile, Lok Sabha Speaker Purno A Sangma on Monday reserved till Tuesday his ruling on the admissibility of a motion moved by Jaswant Singh (BJP) on the conduct of UP Governor Romesh Bhandari who, he said, had ''exceeded his limits'' while rebutting the Union home minister's statement in the House last week.

''The governor has questioned the authority of the home minister, impeding the executive power and acted in a manner contradicting the central government's authority. The issue under dicussion is not merely the law and order situation of the state but the conduct of the governor,'' Singh said during Zero Hour, pressing the Speaker to admit his motion under rule 184 which could only censure the government.

During the hour-long debate on the admissibility of the motion, Singh found support from Indian Union Muslim League member G M Banatwala who said the BJP MP had a right to give notice to discuss the issue as it is a matter of ''grave importance to parliamentary democracy.''

Banatwala said the governor and the home minister were in apparent conflict. ''If you want to recall the governor, the purpose would not be served if a discussion was allowed under rule 193,'' he said.

Former prime minister Chandra shekhar said the best way to avoid a discussion on the governor's conduct was a statement from the government on the issue. The governor's rebuttal and the chief secretary's statement on the issue, Chandra Shekhar said, were not expected in a parliamentary democracy.