Telangana High Court on Wednesday took exception to the style of functioning of some officials of Telangana State Pollution Control Board.
A bench of Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice Anil Kumar Jukanti, while hearing a writ petition filed by an industrial unit owner, observed that the working of the board was in a sorry state of affairs. The petitioner knocked the doors of the HC seeking a direction to quash a notice issued by the board. He contended that he had replied in detail to a show cause notice issued by the Joint Chief Environmental Engineer of TSPCB, D. Krupanand. But the officer stated that no reply was filed by the petitioner’s factory.
When the matter came up for hearing on Wednesday, the CJ sought to know why the joint chief environmental engineer stated that no reply was furnished by the petitioner despite the latter specifically filing it. Turning to Additional Advocate General Imran Khan, the CJ remarked that it called for drastic measures against the officials of TSPCB.
“The system in the TSPCB should be overhauled and its working made transparent..”, CJ Alok Aradhe said. The bench remarked that it had been seeing the conduct of the board for the past seven months. “I had been noticing the functioning of the board...some officer issues notice and some other officer will pass an order and he will write that no reply has been filed...”, the CJ noted.
The bench said that denial of the engineer about the reply given by the petitioner company indicated that the show cause notice was issued in violation of the principles of natural justice. Such action of the officials cannot be sustained in the eyes of the law, the bench noted, quashing the show cause notice issued by the board.
The bench directed the government to assign the issue relating to the show cause notice in the specific case to some other officer. The latter should give an opportunity to the petitioner to explain his version. Fresh orders should be passed within 15 days in the matter, the bench said.
