The Telangana High Court on Saturday declined to take up for hearing the petitions filed by Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) president and former chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao (KCR) and former irrigation minister T. Harish Rao seeking to halt the tabling of the Justice P.C. Ghose Commission report in the state assembly. The report indicts the former BRS government over alleged irregularities in the execution of the Kaleshwaram lift irrigation project.
Both KCR and Harish Rao had moved house motion petitions requesting the court to direct the government not to table the report or initiate coercive action against them even if a discussion takes place in the assembly. However, court officials confirmed that the petitions were only referred to the registry and would likely be taken up on Monday.
Earlier, on August 21, the two leaders filed writ petitions challenging the Ghose Commission report. After two days of hearings, a bench of Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice G.M. Mohiuddin on August 22 declined to pass interim orders quashing the report. The matter is posted for further hearing in October. Advocate General A. Sudarshan Reddy had assured the court that any further action by the government would follow only after a discussion in the assembly.
Commenting on the development, legal expert and former central information commissioner Sridhar Acharyulu Madabhushi said it was within the Speaker’s discretion to schedule discussions, even on Sundays. “There are precedents of Parliament functioning on Sundays to discuss important matters. Perhaps that is the reason why the high court did not entertain the petitions of KCR and Harish Rao to stall the debate,” he observed.
Meanwhile, the BRS’ demand to make a PowerPoint presentation in the assembly explaining its stand on the Kaleshwaram project was rejected. State legislative affairs minister D. Sridhar Babu said there was no precedent for opposition parties making such presentations. “Even when the BRS was in power, it never gave such an opportunity to the Congress,” he pointed out.
