Vijayawada: The Andhra Pradesh High Court has directed the Andhra Pradesh government to submit details of how many advisers have been appointed, to which all departments, and the norms guiding their appointment.
A division bench of Chief Justice Prashant Mishra and Justice DVSS Somayajulu heard petitions before issuing the order here on Thursday.
The court asked the state government to explain as to how it could expect to get better advice from the advisers when senior IAS officers were heading the departments. “How many advisers can the state government appoint,” it asked.
The court observed that if the state government went on appointing advisers, it might even appoint advisers to police officers and to tahsildars.
The court wanted to know on what basis the advisers were being appointed and their wages paid. The court wanted to know the constitutional validity of appointing advisers and asked the advocate general to submit all details before the case’s next hearing on Jan. 19.
The court permitted petitioner J. Srikanth to continue as an adviser to the endowments department subject to its final verdict. Earlier, the court had issued a stay order on his appointment as adviser.
