Bench grants four weeks to respond to Telangana survey notice

Hyderabad: The Hyderabad High Court bench dealing with a PIL by Dr J. Ram Mohan Chowdhary, a social activist who alleged the Telangana government conducted the Intensive Household Survey with an malafide intention in order to make people belonging to Seemandhra ineligible for welfare schemes implemented by the Centre and the state.

The issue came up before the High Court again and the petitioner submitted that in the absence of statutory power, the government had administered oath/affirmation during the survey for purpose of legalising the “quasiracial and tamperable data” which was ultra vires to the Oath Act, 1969. The bench granted four weeks to the respondents to file their counter affidavits on the plea.