Hyderabad: Government gets an earful for fixing 5k monthly honorarium for retired judge

Hyderabad: The High Court division bench headed by Chief Justice Hima Kohli and Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy on Thursday was dealing with a batch of six writ petitions and two Public Interest Litigations, with one of a direction to the State government to constitute the Appellate Authority for the Telangana Pollution Control Board.

Chief Justice Hima Kohli took a very strong objection to the proposal sent by the State government in sanctioning a paltry of Rs 5000 per month honorarium and Rs 1,000 per sitting to a retired Judge, who would be heading the Telangana Appellate Authority for the Telangana State Pollution Control Board, and directed the Registrar General, High Court to immediately return such a letter to the State government.

"I am sorry, the Registrar General, High Court has been told to return the letter to the Telangana State government. I do not entertain such a letter received from the State government as it is absolutely an insult to us that a retired Judge will be paid Rs 5,000 honorarium per month. Does the State government think that retired Judges are hanging around for work at a paltry sum of Rs 5000?" she questioned.

"I as the Chief Justice of the Telangana High Court refuse to pass any order on such a letter on the administrative side as it is insulting for the High Court.

One does not give such a paltry amount to the local commissioner to visit a site, forget about the retired Judge," the CJ opined. The above was a strong objection taken by the Chief Justice after the court saw the proposed letter sent by the Secretary, Environment and Forest, Telangana Government requesting the Chief Justice to nominate the name of a retired Judge to head the Appellate Authority for the Telangana State Pollution Control Board.

Advocate General Banda Shivananda Prasad was once again asked as to why he didn't take due indulgence in such issues and advise the government in a proper manner, prior to sending a proposal to the High Court. The Chief Justice directed the Advocate General to advise the State government to issue a fresh GO by Monday, failing which the CJ made it amply clear that the court would take the concerned Secretary of the respective department for the task. Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy also took strong objection to such a proposal of the State Government and described it a "demeaning act".

He reminded the Advocate General about the uniform procedure followed by the governments while sending such proposals to the High Court. Whether it is the appointment of retired Judges to the Human Rights Commission or Lokayukta, the governments do follow procedures, which is missing in this letter, observed Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy. For further hearing, the matter was adjourned to April 27.