Hyderabad High Court issues bailable warrant against Andhra Pradesh transport chief

HYDERABAD: Taking seriously the non-appearance of the officer in a PIL despite the court’s direction, a division bench of the Hyderabad High Court on Tuesday issued bailable warrant to AP Transport Commissioner N Balasubramanyam. The transport commissioner of Telangana appeared before the court, but did not submit the required information sought by the court.The bench of Acting Chief Justice Ramesh Ranganathan and Justice Abhinand Kumar Shavili was dealing with the PIL filed by K V Subba Reddy from Krishna district seeking action against the authorities concerned for the loss of lives in the accident involving Diwakar travels in February this year. The bus was registered in the name of JC Uma Reddy of Tadipatri in Anantapur district as a contract carriage and operated between Bhubaneswar and Hyderabad via Vijayawada.

On an earlier occasion, the bench directed both the transport commissioners to appear before it with requisite information regarding the number of violations identified and cancellation of permits of the erring private transport operators, steps taken for welfare of the drivers, working hours and so on. Pursuant to the court direction, the transport commissioner of Telangana appeared before the bench on Tuesday. When his counterpart from AP did not appear, the bench took it seriously. “The officials are taking the orders of the court very lightly,” the bench observed while issuing the bailable warrant against the AP  Transport Commissioner.  

While refusing the plea of AP advocate general D Srinivas request to cancel the warrant, the bench pointed out that the officials have failed to implement properly the Motor Transport Workers Act, 1961.
The bench directed the both the transport commissioners to appear before the court on November 21 with the information pertaining to the number of Motor Transport undertakings plying in AP & Telangana.

HC seeks report  
A division bench of the Hyderabad High Court on Tuesday granted two-week time to the AP government to inform the court about the time schedule for identification of project-affected families in areas where the land was taken but no rehabilitation was done. The bench was dealing with the case filed by the AP Agricultural Workers Union, represented by its general secretary V Venkateswarlu.