Govt in deep slumber, Addl AG tells HC

Hyderabad: The issue of restoration of lease over an extent of 5.6 acres of prime land situated within the premises of Old Gandhi Hospital at Basheer Bagh for construction of an Urban Entertainment Centre saw interesting exchanges in the High Court at Hyderabad on Monday.

The public interest litigation filed by Chandra Kishore Jaiswal, who is seeking a CBI probe into this deal, came up before the division bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Dilip B Bhosale and Justice P Naveen Rao. When senior counsel for the consortium, whose lease was restored, Madan Mohan Reddy told the bench that the lease was restored after due process by the government and pointed to the letter issued by the then Special Chief Secretary of Andhra Pradesh government, the Telangana Additional Advocate General J Ramchandra Rao termed that letter a fraud.

The bench asked Additional Advocate General if that was the case, why no action was taken even after two years of the new government taking charge. Were they waiting for this PIL? The Additional AG made a startling statement that that the government had been in “deep slumber” and that he would request the government to take action at the earliest.

He charged that a Minister in the then Kiran Kumar Reddy Cabinet was hell-bent on handing over the lease again to defaulter company and thus caused huge loss to exchequer. Madan Mohan Reddy termed this assertion of Additional AG as more of a political speech rather than legal argument.

The counsel for petitioner Vedula Srinivas said his client was willing to withdraw the petition if the government made a statement that it would take action in this matter. The case was adjourned to Tuesday for final orders.