Hyderabad: The Hyderabad HC on Monday declined to issue notice to IAS officer Smitha Sabharwal on petitions challenging the decision of the Telangana government to extend financial assistance to meet legal expenses in a defamation case against the management of Outlook magazine.
The bench was dealing with two PILs filed by K. Eshwar Rao and Vattsala Vidyasagar and a writ petition by Outlook Publishing challenging the GO issued by the government on August 28 sanctioning Rs 15 lakh to Ms Sabharwal, additional secretary in the CMO, for payment of court fee and expenses for filing a civil suit seeking damages of Rs 10 crore against the management of Outlook for publishing of news report along with a cartoon allegedly to defame her.
The bench said that it was of the opinion that there was nothing wrong in extending financial assistance to an officer whenever the government felt that its image was tainted due to the publication of a report.
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