Lucknow, Oct. 12 -- Even as the Uttar Pradesh government has recently extended the tenure of the chairpersons and members of the SC-ST and Women's Commissions, several other key statutory bodies in the state have once again fallen vacant or remain defunct for years due to non-appointments. The latest to become headless is the UP Commission for Other Backward Classes (OBC Commission) after the one-year tenure of its chairman Rajesh Verma and all but one member ended last month. "Currently, the 28-member commission has only one member whose one-year tenure will also end shortly. The one-year term of all other members, including chairman and two vice-chairmen, ended over a month ago," OBC commission secretary Manoj Kumar Sagar said. "We expect reconstitution of the commission very soon," he added. Set up in September 1993 to examine inclusion requests and complaints regarding backward class listings and safeguard OBC rights, the commission has faced long spells of inactivity. It remained non-functional from March 2022 after its then chairman Jaswant Singh Saini, was inducted as a minister in the Yogi Adityanath government and was revived only in September 2024, barely a year before becoming vacant again. The commission, located on the third floor of Indira Bhawan in Lucknow, had earlier functioned without a chairman for nearly two years after Phagu Chauhan was appointed Bihar governor in July 2019. The government filled the post only in June 2021, months before the assembly polls. The OBC Commission is not alone. Several other statutory and quasi-judicial bodies have met a similar fate. The UP Cow Commission, UP OBC Finance and Development Corporation, and the UP State Commission for Protection of Child Rights are all without chairpersons or members. The four-member UP State Consumer Forum is functioning at only half its capacity. Some important commissions created under specific legislation have remained defunct for years. The U.P. State Food Commission, U.P. Board for Development of Municipal Financial Resources, and the U.P. Water Management and Regulatory Commission (UPWMRC) are among them. The State Food Commission, established in 2015 under the National Food Security Act, 2013 to look into complaints of ration denial under the Public Distribution System, has remained locked since December 31, 2021. Similarly, the Board for Development of Municipal Financial Resources, formed in 2011 following the 13th Finance Commission's recommendations to boost urban local bodies' revenues, has been without a chairman since November 2021. Perhaps, the worst case is that of the U.P. Water Management and Regulatory Commission, constituted in March 2014 to regulate and recommend tariffs for water used in agriculture, industry, power generation, and drinking purposes. Defunct practically since inception, it took four years to get its first chairman in 2018, who demitted office in March 2021 after serving an extended term. He functioned virtually alone, without any other member, member-secretary or regular staff. The post has been vacant since. Officials admit that though the government has advertised these posts multiple times over the years, its "search for the right candidates" remains inconclusive. In the monsoon session of the state legislature on August 13, BJP MLC Devendra Pratap Singh asked the government, in the Vidhan Parishad, how long it would take to reconstitute the Food Commission. The government replied that the process was underway, the same response it had given to the same member six months earlier. Most commissions have a one-year tenure, extendable by another year at a time. While some were filled simultaneously in September-October 2024, only a few like the Women's Commission and the SC-ST Commission have seen tenure renewals this year, leaving the fate of others hanging in the balance....