Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Friday summoned chief secretary, Somesh Kumar to appear before the court on December 23 pertaining to Hill Fort restoration.
He was summoned to explain the status of the work relating to the restoration and conservation of Hill Fort Palace, a heritage structure in Hyderabad.
Over the previous five to six hearings, tourism authorities had been informing the court that steps were being taken to start restoration work at the heritage structure, but did not execute the work.
A bench comprising chief justice, Ujjal Bhuyan and Justice CV Bhaskar Reddy following the case, hearing a PIL (public interest litigation) petition seeking the conservation of the coveted heritage building, took serious exception to the response of the officials concerned in the matter.
Proceedings were issued to undertake works to conserve the heritage structure in February 2020 after the PIL plea was filed.
The court also warned, “If this is not forthcoming, we are afraid we will be compelled to pass necessary orders against all the erring officials including initiating contempt proceedings.”
On Friday, Harender Pershad, a special government pleader, presented a letter written by Telangana State Tourism Development Corporation Limited’s managing director to the advocate general stating that the corporation was instructed to clean the palace.
Along with the letter, some photographs were annexed as proof of cleaning operations at the palace.
The bench observed that the persons in the photographs seen holding the brooms “are well-dressed and gives an impression that they are employees of the Corporation or of some government undertaking.”
The bench remarked that summoning the officials to the court has become a useless formality as these officers are either incompetent or are not at all interested in carrying out the work which is the subject matter of the PIL.
The bench further notified that the HC was misled all these with the officials stating that the government was moved for sanctioning Rs 50 crore for the restoration and conservation of the palace.
But in reality, nothing has been done, the bench noted.
The bench directed the secretary of transport, roads and buildings, KS Sreenivasa Raju, and in-charge secretary of youth advancement, tourism and culture, TK Sreedevi, finance secretary, Lokesh Kumar, GHMC commissioner, B Manohar Rao, managing director (Full Additional Charge) TTDC, S. Bala Krishna HMDA director (Planning) and special chief secretary, municipal administration and urban development, Arvind Kumar to appear before the court.
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