HYDERABAD: Making it difficult for convicted bureaucrats to get away from the punishments imposed by single judges in contempt cases, the Telangana high court has made it clear that henceforth all the convicted officers have to be physically or virtually present before the court at the time of hearing their appeals against the convictions.
A bench of Chief Justice Hima Kohli and Justice B Vijaysen Reddy which earlier made it mandatory for all such bureaucrats to furnish their previous contempt history has now added an additional condition that they have to be present before the court and that they should also pay the penalty to get their jail sentence stayed.
"This will be the future course hereafter and you cannot get away easily," the bench warned three convicted bureaucrats in separate cases when their appeals came up for hearing. The bench was hearing contempt appeals filed by Warangal rural RDO Ch Mahender Ji, who was convicted in a contempt case with two months of jail and Rs 2,000 penalty for ignoring the court orders in a case pertaining to land acquisition for road expansion.
The others were: SR Nagar sun-inspector Ashok Nayak who was given a sentence of four weeks of jail and Rs 2,000 penalty and A Satyanarayana reddy, secretary of Telangana residential schools society, with two months jail and Rs 2,000 penalty for ignoring court orders in respect of timescale wages and increments to be paid to the teachers.
"First pay the penalties, appear before us and then we will think of staying the jail terms and hearing your appeals," the bench said. It also warned them that they have to go and sit in jails if they do not follow this order.
