The HC issued an interim order on Friday against the shifting of the offices of Commissioner of Vigilance (CoV) and Chairman and member(s) of the Commissionerate of Inquiries (CoI) to Kurnool by suspending the operation of G.O. Ms. No 13.
A three-judge Bench headed by Chief Justice J.K. Maheswari and comprising Justices A.V. Sesha Sai and M. Satyanarayana Murthy ordered that the shifting of the above offices be stalled and accepted the contention of petitioners that the impugned G.O. was vitiated by bad faith. Advocate-General S. Sriram represented the government.
It may be recalled that the government proposed to shift the offices of CoV and chairman of CoI from the Interim Government Complex at Velagapudi in Guntur district to Kurnool, for which Chief Secretary (CS) Nilam Sawhney issued the said G.O. on January 31 citing administrative grounds.
Petitioners’ take
The Engineer-in-Chief of the Roads & Buildings Department and the Kurnool district Collector were instructed to identify suitable buildings for relocating the offices. However, separate petitions, including one by the activists of Amaravati Parirakshana Samiti, were filed in the HC challenging the GO. They argued that the government’s decision was arbitrary.
The government wanted to relocate the HC itself from Nelapadu in the existing capital region to Kurnool as part of the decentralisation of administration.
