Siddipet District Collector P. Venkatrami Reddy tasted the anger of Telangana High Court on Tuesday when he failed to appear before it in an appeal filed by him against punishment in a contempt of court case.
With a division bench headed by Chief Justice Hima Kohli declining to stay the punishment following his absence in the virtual proceedings, the IAS officer finally appeared before the bench towards the end of the session. The CJ declined to stay the single judge order despite repeated requests from Advocate General B.S. Prasad.
“Be careful,” CJ Hima Kohli told the officer when he turned up for the court hearing through video conference. The CJ made it clear to Mr. Reddy that he was contemnor in the case and was supposed to appear before the court when the appeal came up for hearing.
Mr. Reddy along with two other officers Krishna Bhaskar (former Siddipet Collector and current Rajanna Sircilla Collector) and Jayachandra Reddy (Special Deputy Collector, Land Acquisition, Kaleshwaram project Unit-III) was held guilty of contempt of court by a single judge. Some tenant farmers and agricultural labourers of Vemulaghat village of Thoguta mandal of Siddipet filed two contempt of court pleas alleging that the three officers wilfully disobeyed the single judge orders in two writ petitions pertaining to their dispossession of their lands for construction of Mallannasagar reservoir. The petitioners contended that copies of the Detailed Project Report (DPR) in Telugu were not provided to them.
They also charged that their objections were not taken into consideration by the authorities. Holding the officers guilty of contempt of court, the single judge awarded two-month simple imprisonment to Mr. Jayachandra Reddy and imposed ₹2,000 fine on him. The other two officers were imposed with a fine of ₹2,000 each. The judge ordered that an adverse entry should be entered in the service records of the officers.
The three officers filed appeals against the single judge order which came up for hearing before a division bench of CJ and Justice B. Vijaysen Reddy on Tuesday. When the hearing began, Mr. Jayachandra Reddy and Mr. Krishna Bhaskar attended through video conference. When CJ pointed out the absence of Mr. Venkatrami Reddy, the AG explained that he was occupied with an official programme.
With the CJ taking a serious note of the officer’s absence and declining to stay the punishment, the AG said the officer had respect for the HC. “We can take care of our respect,” the CJ observed making it clear that the court would not stay the single judge order.
At that juncture, the AG requested the bench to pass over the matter assuring to secure presence of the officer who joined the proceedings eventually and tendered an apology for his absence.. After hearing contentions of AG and respondents’ counsel, the bench posted the matters to April 12 for next hearing.
