A Division Bench of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, comprising Justices Ahsanuddin Amanullah and T. Rajasekhar Rao, on Thursday suspended the ‘social work’ punishment awarded by Justice Battu Devanand to IAS officers M.M. Naik, B. Rajasekhar, J. Syamala Rao, V. Chinna Veerabhadrudu, Y. Srilakshmi and G. Srkr Vijay Kumar in a contempt case last month, for eight weeks in response to the appeals filed by them.
The case was listed for further hearing after two months.
A similar punishment that had been awarded to two other IAS officers - Gopal Krishna Dwivedi and M. Girija Shankar - was also suspended for eight weeks on April 22.
The IAS officers pleaded with the court that the punishment was contrary to and in excess of the provisions of the Contempt of Courts Act of 1971, and no alternative process of punishment could be undertaken under the Act after accepting their apologies.
Further, they said the consent given by them for the order to do social work was on an assumption that the conviction of contempt would also be erased, but since it was not done, the order of the single Judge was bad in law.
Contempt case
It may be recalled that Mr. Justice Devanand had sentenced the eight IAS officers to simple imprisonment for two weeks and to pay a fine of ₹1,000 each for contempt, but modified the order after they tendered an unconditional apology for failing to discharge their duties, and directed that they instead visit the social welfare hostels in the districts any one Sunday every month for 12 months, spend some time with the students / wards to motivate them and to arrange sumptuous lunch or dinner by spending their personal money.
The IAS officers incurred the wrath of the court for defying its order not to allow the construction of Rythu Bharosa Kendras, ward and village secretariats, and other buildings on the premises of government schools, and to remove such structures which had already come up.
