The ongoing confrontation between the Hyderabad High Court and subordinate judges over the issue of appointment of Andhra-origin judges in Telangana on Monday, further intensified with the High Court suspending two office bearers of Telangana Judges Association including Hyderabad second Additional Metropolitan Judge.
The High Court, taking strong note of Sunday's protest March by the judges to Raj Bhawan in Hyderabad, put Telangana Judges Association president and second Additional Metropolitan Judge K Ravindar Reddy and General Secretary Vara Prasad under suspension.
High Court said that the disciplinary action was taken against the two for violation of code of conduct and interrupting the functioning of the courts.
The action came a day after all the Telangana judges handed over their resignations to the Telangana Judges Association President Ravindar Reddy, saying that the if the provisional list of allocation of judges was not withdrawn in a week by the High Court, their resignations should be forwarded to the Governor.
The protesting judges, who gathered at the Telangana Martyrs Memorial, later marched to the Raj Bhavan. After the police stopped the protest March, a delegation met governor ESl Narasimhan and sought his intervention in to the matter. It was a rare scene that judges took to the street to air their grievances and seek justice.
The controversy erupted after the Hyderabad High Court issued a provisional list, allocating Andhra origin judges to Telangana lower courts, evoking a strong protest from the Telangana judges, lawyers and other judicial officers. Telangana judges and others feel that they were deprived of their rightful share in the appointments by the High Court.
In a hard-hitting letter submitted to the Telangana Judges Associaiton President, the judges said they can not approach the High Court because of its tilt towards AP.
Pointing out that the High Court had appointed 126 judges of AP origin in Telangana, the judges alleged that the AP Government was trying to rule Telangana through judiciary.
“At the same time we can not work under Andhra judicial rulers in future. We being the judges are forced to keep silent against our consciousness. We are unable to raise our voice for the future of Telangana. Therefore with great pain and heavy heart we have decided to quit judgeship in the interest of Golden Telangana”, the judges said in the letter threatening to go on fast unto death in the High Court premises. Judges said they were conscious of the fact that they should follow a code of conduct in discharging of their duties, but when the High Court was indifferent to their problem, they were not reminded of any rule of law.
They question the policy of giving options to judges to chose between Telangan and Andhra as most of the Andhra judges chose to work in Telangana.
In their letter judges said that the High Court administration was threatening the agitating advocates and even the State Government orally
Telangana judges and advocates had boycotted the courts for a week, earlier this month and also organised a march to the Hyderabad High Court. However the march was foiled by the police.
The genesis of the problem lies in the fact that while bifurcating Andhra Pradesh and forming Telangana State in June 2014, the Center had retained a single High Court for both the States.
Telangana judiciary and the political leadership had been demanding the division of the High Court before the allocation of judges into the two States from the existing pool of making new appointments.
Telangana Advocates Joint Action Committee has pointed out that despite repeated assurance the Center has not initiated any steps to fulfill the promise of forming separate High Courts for the two States.