Court reserves review plea on IAS officers

By S A Ishaqui
Hyderabad, March 14: The AP High Court on Friday reserved orders on a petition filed by the IAS officer, Mr L.V. Subramanyam, seeking review of its order that IAS officers come under the jurisdiction of the Lok Ayukta. A division bench comprising Chief Justice A.R. Dave and Justice Ramesh Ranganathan heard arguments on the petition.
Mr Subrahmanyam challenged the earlier orders of the division bench of the court. He stated that the bench has not considered the Constitutional validity of Section 7 and 2 of the AP Lok Ayukta Act.
Justice Ranganathan observed that the question had been considered by the division bench in J. Papa Rao versus Government of AP and the bench had held that IAS officers are amenable to the jurisdiction of the Lok Ayukta.
He said the bench did not agree that the matter should be considered by a larger bench and dismissed the earlier writ. Justice Rangnathan observed that the officer had sanctioned Rs 11 crore to a company the existence of which was under question. The issue referred to the payment of Rs 11 crore to a firm called Vasishta Wahan for a deal to get a plant of the German car-maker Volkswagen to the state.