HC orders 8 IAS officers to do service in social welfare hostels

They were earlier sentenced to imprisonment in a contempt case

Justice B. Devanand of the Andhra Pradesh High Court on Thursday sentenced eight IAS officers — Gopal Krishna Dwivedi, M. Girija Shankar, M.M. Naik, B. Rajasekhar, J. Syamala Rao, V. Chinna Veerabhadrudu, Y. Srilakshmi and G. Srkr. Vijay Kumar — to two weeks’ imprisonment in a contempt case, but modified his order upon the officials tendering an unconditional apology for failing to discharge their duties.

Conceding the officers’ plea, Justice Devanand directed that they should instead do service in social welfare hostels on a particular day every month for a year.

It was a case in which the court pulled up the IAS officers earlier for apparently defying its order not to allow the construction of Rythu Bharosa Kendras (RBKs), ward and village secretariats and other buildings on the premises of government schools.

While pronouncing his verdict, Justice Devanand expressed displeasure that the officers did not consider it their obligation to respect the court order issued in the year 2020, that RBKs and any such government buildings constructed on the school premises should be demolished, but no action was taken for more than a year. 

The IAS officers should, therefore, face the punishment, the Judge ruled, prompting them to apologise for their inaction. Now, the officers had to do service in the hostels and also bear the expenditure entailed by meals provided to the inmates.