Set up security panel by December 27: High Court to Telangana govt

Hyderabad: Censuring the ‘turning a deaf ear’ attitude of the  state government in setting  up institutions and appointing various constitutional posts, the Telangana High Court on Wednesday directed the government to constitute the state security commission  at the state level and the police complaints authority at the  district level in the Telangana state by December 27, 2019.

These were meant for the redressal of public grievances in respect of the abuse of police powers.

While giving these directions, the Division Bench, comprising Chief Justice Raghavendra Singh Chauhan and A. Abhishek Reddy, cautioned the state, that the principal secretary of the  home department has to personally appear before the court on December 30, if these directions were overlooked by the state.

Coming across a flood of petitions before the court complaining about the abuse of power by police authorities and higher officials not responding to public grievances on the abuse of power, the Telangana High court took it as, suo motu, a contempt case.

Earlier, the single judge in 2017 and division bench on July 2, 2018, had directed  the state to establish the authorities concerned. However, these directions have not been paid any heed by the government and the petitions were flowing in before the court against the  police.

Dealing with the case CJ Chauhan said, “It’s been more than one and half years ago that this court had directed the government to constitute the state security commission and police complaints authority, but till today, the orders have not been complied with.”

The CJ further observed that it was unfortunate to mention that the Telangana government was not taking the directions of the court seriously. “As this court is flooded with PILs seeking our intervention to direct the government to expedite the appointments of and to certain vital organisations in the state which have been headless for a long period such as Chairman and  Members to the Human Rights Commission (HRC), Information Commissioners, Lokayukta and Upa-Lokayukta, to name a few.”

“However, the state is turning deaf ears to implement the orders,” the bench said. The court wondered why the state was not establishing the  ‘authorities,’ even after 13 years of Supreme Court directions.

The state security sommission and  police complaint authority  were to be established at the state and district levels following the judgment by the Supreme Court  in Prakash Singh  vs. Union of India  in 2006, in response to the huge volume of complaints against the police and the endemic lack of accountability.

The division  bench of Hyderabad High Court, comprising the then Acting Chief Justice, Ramesh Ranganathan, and Justice J. Uma Devi, on 2 July 2018 rejected  the appeal by Telangana government challenging the order of a single judge to establish authorities, and it directed the state to constitute them within two months from the day of direction. One and a half years later, we are still waiting.