Lucknow, May 17 -- The Lucknow bench of the high court has held that there is no illegality in providing for pension or family pension to former MLAs or former Legislative Council members of the state legislature. The state legislature has full authority to make such legal provisions. With this, the court dismissed a public interest litigation plea challenging the validity of the legal provisions providing for pension or family pension to former MLAs or former MLCs and demanding their declaration as unconstitutional. The petitioner had also requested for the immediate discontinuation of pension or family pension to former MLAs or former Legislative Council members. A division bench of justices Rajan Roy and Abhdesh Kumar Chaudhary delivered this decision on May 13, dismissing the PIL filed by SN Shukla, general secretary of the Lok Prahari Society in 2019. The petitioner had challenged the provisions of the 1980 Act providing pension and other benefits, including family pension, to members and former members of the Uttar Pradesh State Legislature. The petitioner argued that these provisions of the Act were contrary to the intent of the law and should be declared unconstitutional. The court rejected the petitioner's arguments and dismissed the petition. HTC...