Telangana High Court refuses to pass order on criminal cases against netas

A division bench of the Telangana High Court, on Thursday, refused to pass any order/issue notice to the government authorities concerned in the PIL seeking speedy prosecution of pending criminal cases against sitting and former legislators (both MPs and MLAs) and the appointment of a public prosecutor to the special court dealing with such cases.

“The Supreme Court has already seized of the matter, and adhering to its directions, the Telangana High Court is supervising the adjudication of criminal cases before the special court,” the bench noted. The PIL filed by Forum for Good Governance (FGG) — an NGO represented by its secretary M Padmanabha Reddy — came up for hearing before the bench comprising Chief Justice Raghvendra Singh Chauhan and Justice B Vijaysen Reddy.

Senior advocate S Satyam Reddy, appearing for the petitioner, told the court that though the special court was established two and half years ago, there was no progress in disposal of pending criminal cases. He added that this was a clear violation of the Apex Court orders. “Due to paucity of staff, like public prosecutors, the adjudication has lost pace,” he said.

The bench said that the High Court had already directed the State government to fill up 200 vacancies of public prosecutors. “Further, the lower courts and special courts are functioning in adherence to Covid norms. Hence, the hearings are a bit slow,” the bench said. “The petitioner needn’t worry about the prosecution of such cases as their trials are directly monitored the SC and HC,” it said.