Stop police interference in civil rows

By S A Ishaqui

Hyderabad,July 8: The Andhra Pradesh High Court has directed the director-general of police to frame guidelines to curb unwarranted interference of the police in civil disputes.

Justice C.V. Nagarjuna Reddy while dealing with a petition filed by one Ms Farzana Begum complaining that the assistant commissioner of Cyberabad is interfering in a dispute between her and one Abdul Sattar pertaining to her plot at Balapur, directed the DGP to initiate departmental proceedings against the ACP.

The judge observed: “This court has been time and again directing the police not to interfere in civil disputes. The instances of complaints by way of writ petitions against such interference are increasing of late.” “It is regretful that directions given by this court in such cases are not yielding proper results. The police appears to be treating the directions being confined only to individual cases.’’

The judge pointed out that wherever the police is caught red-handed in such cases, they tried to escape by offering lame excuses. In the present case also the ACP sent a routine reply.

The judge directed the DGP to ensure that the police should strictly adhere to the guidelines prepared by him to prevent the police from interfering in civil disputes. He asked the DGP to file action taken report to the court by August 4.

Wakf changes opposed

The Centre, on Wednesday, strongly opposed before the Andhra Pradesh High Court an argument on scrapping Section 14 of the Wakf Act.

The additional Solicitor General of India, Mr Mohan Parasaran, while arguing before a division bench comprising Justice Ghulam Mohammed and Justice Vilas V. Afzulpurkar said that mutavallies are managers of Wakf properties and their functions are not religious in nature.

The bench was dealing with a petition filed by association of AP Sajjada Nasheens, mutavallies and Khidmat Gizaran of Wakfs seeking a direction to scrap the Section 14 of the Act.

The petitioners contended that the Section allowed unnecessary political interference in the affairs of the Wakf Board by appointing MLAs and MPs and elected representatives in the Board. The division posted the hearing to July 13.

DRT case to be held in Chennai

The Centre has referred the matter pertaining to the allegations against D. Gopala Krishna, presiding officer of the Hyderabad Debts Recovery Tribunal (DRT) to the debt recovery appellate tribunal of Chennai to conduct an inquiry.

The assistant Solicitor-General Mr A. Rajasekhara Reddy told this to the Andhra Pradesh High Court on Wednesday during the hearing of a batch of writ petitions filed against the presiding officer.

Mr Reddy told the court that the appellate tribunal is the competent authority to inquire into the issue, but the post of chairman of the appellate tribunal is lying vacant and he asked the Centre to hand over the case to an appropriate authority.

Info sought from entrepreneurs

The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Wednesday asked about 140 entrepreneurs to inform it on when they will establish their industries on the land allotted to them by the Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation.

The court was dealing with a batch writ petitions filed by the entrepreneurs challenging the orders passed by APIIC cancelling their allotments on the ground that they failed to establish industries on the land.

The APIIC allotted lands at Industrial Estates in West Godavari, Visakhapatnam, Guntur, Nellore, Prakasam, Mahbubnagar and Anantapur districts.

The petitioner contended that the APIIC did not have the power to cancel the sale deed once it is executed.