Hyderabad: The Hyderabad High Court on Thursday pulled up the Centre for issuing a clarification that the AP Administrative Tribunal had jurisdiction over AP and Telangana states.
A division Bench comprising Chief Justice Kalyan Jyoti Sengupta and Justice P.V. Sanjay Kumar was dealing with petitions questioning the jurisdiction of the Tribunal with regard to service matters of employees of Telangana government after bifurcation.
The Bench sought to know from the Assistant Solicitor General (ASG) under which provision of law had it issued such clarification when there was no specific provision under the AP Reorganisation Act with regard to its jurisdiction.
The ASG submitted that the Legal Affairs department of the Centre had issued a “clarification” to the then state government by informing it that the AP Tribunal would have territorial jurisdiction over both the states for a period of two years from the Appointed Day and the same clarification was also placed before the court through an affidavit by the Centre.
Justice Kumar also asked the ASG whether any notification had been issued by the Centre regarding territorial jurisdiction of APAT.
When the ASG replied in the negative, Justice Sengupta expressed his displeasure at the Centre and said, “Justify under which provision of law was the clarification issued by the Centre.
What the authorities have done is irrelevant and mindless. It is creating more confusion than clarification. It is for the President to issue any clarification. Don’t act in a whimsical manner”.
Telangana Advocate General K. Ramakrishna Reddy, meanwhile, told the Bench that so far Telangana and AP had not made any requests with the Ce-ntre towards setting up of separate administrative tribunals for both the states. The Bench posted the hearing to next week.
