HC calls Telangana response on RTC ‘financial jugglery’

Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Tuesday summoned the in-charge managing director and finance officer of TSRTC on November 1 to expla-in verified and authentic financial figures claimed by the state government.

This was after the state government submitted to the court that it would not allot any money to the RTC immediately. The government also said it does not owe a single penny to the corporation, saying, it had relea-sed more than `4,253 crore to RTC as budge-tary support since 2014.

The High Court division bench, comprising Chief Justice Raghaven-dra Singh Chauhan and Justice A. Abhishek Reddy, described the government’s explanations in the affidavit submitted by principal secretary of finance department, explaining allocation and sanction of funds to RTC, as “financial jugglery” and “a fudge.”

K. Ramakrishna Rao, principal secretary, submitted the affidavit on Tuesday to the court as per directions given on Monday by the court while dealing PILs related RTC strike. The court had asked the government to verify and explain claims by RTC worker unions that the government and GHMC owed `2,475 crore and `1,492 crore respectively to RTC towards bus pass concessions.

In the affidavit, Mr Rao said that out of claim of `2,475 crore, `1099 amo-unt was due up to 2013-14. Mr Rao said the government could not able to pay this amount as the issue of liabilities and as-sets had not been decided by the Union government to successor corporations in Telangana and AP after bifurcation.

Regarding the remaining amount due from government and GHMC, the affidavit said that Rs 3,403 crore had been rel-eased by the government as budgetary support.

The state government had also given guarantee to creditors for Rs 850 crore, based on which, they had extended loans to the RTC, he said. He further claimed that GHMC has paid Rs 335 crore to the corporation.

Terming the affidavit as highly misplaced and un-clear, the Bench said that the bureaucrat had tried to cover up facts in a way that it seen in one way it could be true but perceived in another, it was false.

The HC Bench was furious about state’s claim that a guarantee leading to a loan of Rs 850 crore could be accounted as allotted. The Court posed several questions to the government on how it could term the “release of reimbursement as a budgetary allocation.”

Reacting to the government’s reply that it was not in a position to immediately allocate `47 crores to RTC because of economic slowdown, the court chided the government for not being concerned with right priorities.

On Monday, the court had asked the government to respond to its proposal to allocate Rs 47 crore for fulfilling four simple and legitimate demands of striking employees, which would build confidence between workers and government.

Chief Justice Chauhan, responding to the government’s refusal to the Court’s proposal, said, “when you (government) can shell out Rs 100 crore for development of a particular constituency (Huzurnagar, wherein by-poll has been held and government has allocated Rs 100 crore for voting for TRS), why can’t you allocate `47 crore on the most important issue to entire population of Telangana State?”

“Who should be your priority? Whether 10 lakh people of one constituency or the population of an entire state? How reasonable is your stand? You are not supporting the corporation meant for every single citizen of the state. Are those people not important to you?” the CJ commented.

Justice Abhishek Reddy questioned advocate general B.S. Prasad as to what prevented the state from requesting the Centre and AP government to finalize distribution of liabilities among both corporations, since this issue has been under the carpet for last five years.

The Bench also sought the Central government’s response on finalization of assets and liabilities among successor corporations in two states. It also asked the Centre to clarify its stand on financial support to RTC.