Rangareddy collector faces contempt case for selective adoption of HC orders

Hyderabad: Justice T Madhavi Devi of the Telangana High Court has issued a suo motu contempt notice to C Narayana Reddy, the current Rangareddy district collector, for his actions during his tenure as the Nalgonda district collector.

The court found that Reddy selectively adopted judicial precedents that supported his own interpretation while implementing a previous court order, rather than adhering to the full essence of the directives issued by the High Court.

Background of the case

The case concerns the extension of minimum time scale of pay and annual grade increments to daily wage and ad-hoc workers in the rural development wing.

The High Court had earlier instructed the district collector to make a decision in accordance with the judgments cited by the workers’ counsel, which required the benefits to be extended to such workers.

However, since the arrears dated back to 1997, the then Nalgonda collector rejected the workers’ applications, arguing that the cited judgments applied only to regular employees and not to ad-hoc workers. Crucially, he ignored other judgments that mandated fixing a minimum pay scale for ad-hoc workers as well.

Court’s observations and action

Justice Madhavi Devi questioned whether the collector had deliberately adopted a selective approach, choosing only those judgments that suited his position.

The judge emphasised that it was necessary to hold the bureaucrat accountable for misinterpreting the court’s order rather than asking the current collector to explain the previous actions.

In a significant move, Justice Madhavi Devi added Narayana Reddy as a respondent in the contempt plea and issued notice to him.

The judge, however, acknowledged the possibility that Reddy might have misunderstood the essence of the High Court order and granted him four weeks to comply with the court’s directive or face further contempt proceedings.

Next steps

C Narayana Reddy has been given a four-week window to rectify the situation and implement the court’s order as intended. Failure to do so could result in contempt proceedings against him.