Hyderabad: Justice T. Vinod Kumar of the Telangana High Court ruled that maternity leave of a medical scholar must be included while calculating her attendance. The judge was passing an interim order in a writ petition filed by Dr K. Sirisha, a student of gynaecology and obstetrics, against Kaloji Narayana Rao Medical University (KNRMU). She approached the court when the university refused to include her in the list of eligible candidates for the ensuing final examination on the ground of lack of attendance. The court faulted the stance of the Medical Council and the university in excluding maternity leave while calculating the attendance of a candidate for the purposes of taking a written examination. He said it was contrary to the very law related to extending maternity leave. He directed the authorities to permit the candidate to take the examination and to upload her attendance by including her maternity leave as part of her attendance and to put it on the portal to enable her to take further steps for appearing in the ensuing examination.
HC suspends Chilkalguda mosque’s panel
Justice Vinod Kumar admitted a writ petition challenging the constitution of the managing committee of Jamma Masjid Ahle-Adees, a mosque at Chilkalguda in the city. The writ petition was filed by Iftekhar Hussain, who contended that the procedure adopted by the Wakf Board was contrary to the procedure laid down under GO 74. Counsel for Wakf Board unsuccessfully argued that the petitioner and his panel were disqualified because of multiple cases against it, including one filed by the Board. Pointing out the prescribed law, Justice Vinod reasoned that it was not open for the Board to prescribe disqualifications not mentioned in the law. The judge accordingly suspended the constitution of the committee.
RI against two farmers for ‘caste’ remarks set aside
Justice K. Surender of the Telangana High Court set aside a sentence against two agriculturists of Mahbubnagar, who were to undergo a month’s rigorous imprisonment for committing an offence under the Protection of Civil Rights Act. According to the prosecution, the alleged offence occurred between the complainant and the accused regarding an electrical transformer in their village wherein the victim, who is the complainant, was abused in the name of his caste.
The magistrate and the sessions’ judge convicted the accused. Allowing the revision in favour of the accused, Justice Surender pointed out that even admitting that the abusive language employed by the accused was in the name of the caste, it was not a case of the prosecution the petitioners have either preached or practiced ‘untouchability’. Only in the event of making any remarks that defile such members of the upper caste or preventing such persons from either being part of any social gathering or stating that they coming into contact with them would defile a person. The judge also pointed out that no steps were taken by the prosecution to prosecute the petitioners for any of the offences under the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
HC quashes criminal proceedings against local trader
Justice K. Surender of the Telangana High Court quashed criminal proceedings against J. Satyanarayana, a businessman from Noorkhan Bazar in the city in a criminal case filed against him pending with central crime station for ‘obtaining’ a fake municipal trade licence. The case was registered on a complaint by his brother, who alleged that a shop named Aditya Traders was being run as a proprietary concern. The complainant’s brother and sister created a partnership firm and fabricated a trade provisional licence by tampering with the electronic data of GHMC.
According to the petitioner, there are no allegations against him and he was made a party only for the reason of this petitioner supporting his sister in the civil suit between the parties. It was contended that the document was filed before the court concerned and it was for the said court to decide about the correctness or otherwise of the document and the same cannot be filed as a criminal complaint and police cannot investigate.
Further, to attract an offence of cheating, there has to be an act of fraudulent deception pursuant to which property must have been delivered. No such allegation is made against this petitioner, Justice Surender reasoned while quashing the complaint. He also reasoned that to attract offences under fraudulent acts the document has to be used as a genuine one despite knowing that it was fabricated. It is nowhere mentioned that the petitioner had in any manner used the trade licence before any authority.
