HC Directs State To Avoid Delay In Fisheries Cooperative Societies' Elections
Justice Surepalli Nanda passed the order while hearing a petition filed by Sadhu Raghu of Mulugu district and others, challenging the inaction of officials on their representations seeking conduct of elections.
Hyderabad:The Telangana High Court has directed the state government to ensure that elections to the remaining primary and district-level fisheries cooperative societies were not delayed and that their governing bodies were constituted democratically within three weeks. Justice Surepalli Nanda passed the order while hearing a petition filed by Sadhu Raghu of Mulugu district and others, challenging the inaction of officials on their representations seeking conduct of elections.
Counsel D.L. Pandu, for the petitioners, submitted that the court had earlier directed authorities to follow the tentative election schedule or, if it could not be implemented, issue a fresh schedule and complete the process expeditiously. The court directed officials to consider the petitioners’ representations and take an appropriate decision within three weeks.
Hyderabad:A division bench of the Telangana High Court has set aside a single judge’s order that had directed the state government to release Rythu Bandhu investment support to certain farmers for the Kharif and Rabi seasons of 2019.
The single judge in September 2024 had directed the state government to disburse the amount to the petitioner farmers from Khammam district. The single judge had also dismissed the government’s review petition following which the state filed an appeal.
The contention of the state government was that during Kharif 2019, assistance was extended to farmers holding land up to 10 acres; during Rabi 2019, the benefit was restricted to farmers holding land up to six acres each, subject to availability of funds. Since the petitioners owned land substantially exceeding the limits, they were not entitled to receive the benefit for those seasons. The non-release of the assistance was part of a policy decision taken amid financial constraints during the Covid-19 pandemic, the government said.
The division bench comprising Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice G.M. Mohiuddin held that a writ court could not compel the government to make a payment that was not budgeted for. It consequently set aside both the 2024 order directing payment and the 2026 order in the review petition.
The division bench noted that during 2019-20, the government had prioritised farmers with smaller landholdings because of budgetary constraints. As many as 1,41,993 farmers were reportedly not extended the benefit for Kharif 2019, involving `850.82 crore, while 9,46,009 farmers were denied assistance for Rabi 2019, involving `2,132.95 crore.
Relying on the Supreme Court’s ruling that courts should ordinarily refrain from intervening in economic and fiscal policy decisions unless they were arbitrary, irrational or contrary to law, the division bench said that administrative communication made earlier could not have been construed as an admission of liability or an assurance to release the Rythu Bandhu assistance for the Kharif and Rabi of 2019.
