HC toughens stand on Maytas Infra works

Noting that state government seems to have become allergic to the idea of adhering to the constitutional provisions, AP High Court on Thursday summoned authorities to get measurement (M) book pertaining to construction of a community hall in Kadapa district which was being shown on paper as a work whose construction was completed by Maytas Infra company. The division bench comprising Justice Goda Raghuram and Justice Naushad Ali made this order while hearing a petition that challenged the  entrustment of huge number of rehabilitation and reconstruction works in Kadapa and elsewhere to Maytas Infra on nomination basis and not on the basis of open tenders. The state government has been maintaining that it has not shown any favouritism towards Maytas but only entrusted the rehabilitation works to the main contractors involved in the construction of Galeru Nagari Sujala Sravanthi irrigation project.

As part of this project, the height enhancement of Gandikota reservoir was awarded to Maytas Infra and as this enhancement would result in submergence of nearby villages,the resultant rehabilitation works are also entrusted to Maytas, special government counsel N Sridhar Reddy said. This when their open tenders received no response from the contractors, he said. Several works are now complete and some of them are partially done. If we do not make payments now then they will not complete the rest of the works, the counsel said and sought the courts permission to go ahead in this regard because an earlier stay imposed on them was stopping them. Counsel for the petitioner P Veera Reddy refuted these claims and told the court that a community hall said to have been completed in Obulapuram village of Kadapa district is not completed and in fact alleged that the work had not even begun in that village.

The bench then summoned the M book and warned the authorities that it would order a probe into the matter if necessary. If there is no response to your tender notification in one district, you cannot entrust works on nomination basis in all districts showing the nil response in one district as a pretext, the bench told the state. The matter would come up for hearing on Monday again.
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HC raps SBH in mortgage case


Rapping State Bank of Hyderabad  officials for attempting to take possession of a mortgaged property in an arbitrary manner,the AP High Court on Thursday quashed the possession proceedings launched by the bank and directed it to act afresh in accordance with the provisions of the Securitisation Act. The court also slapped on the bank costs of the litigation and directed them to pay Rs 5,000 towards costs. The division bench comprising Justice Goda Raghuram and Justice Naushad Ali delivered this verdict after hearing a petition filed by one G Prabhakar of Hyderabad who charged authorities of SBHs Shapurnagar and Ramkoti branches with negligence and lack of responsibility in their approach. His contention was that though he did not take any loan from the bank,nor mortgaged any asset with the bank for availing loan, bank authorities were trying to take possession of the property owned by his daughter. The bench directed the bank to hand over the possession of the mortgaged asset to the petitioner immediately.
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(source-toi)