Congress leaders observed that the Chief Secretary of the state

After expelled Congress MLA S.A. Sampath Kumar expressed displeasure, Telangana Congress leaders, under the leadership of TPCC preside-nt N. Uttam Kumar Red-dy, on Monday met Governor E.S.L. Narasimhan and Chief Secretary S.K. Joshi and urged to implement the High Court judgement on expelled MLAs’ issue.

In a memorandum submitted to the Governor, the Congress leaders req-uested him to direct the TS government and Assembly to restore all the benefits and privileges that were available to Ko-matireddy Venkata Re-ddy and S.A. Sampath Kumar as sitting MLAs of the TS Assembly and to uphold the rule of law and the judgement in true letter and spirit.

The Congress leaders said that the two Congr-ess MLAs were expelled from the House on Mar-ch 13, 2018 and later the vacancy of seats were declared on the same day by duly notifying the Election Commission of India. They said that both the expelled MLAs filed a writ petition wh-ich was allowed by the High Court, setting aside the expulsion order pas-sed by the House and dir-ected the state government to restore the membership of the two MLAs for their remaining period as duly elected MLAs for all purposes.

They said that though 20 days had elapsed from the date of delivery of the judgement, neither the state government nor the Assembly preferred any appeal against the said judgement, thereby allowing the judgement of the Single Judge to be retained. They said the court had observed that the membership of the two expelled MLAs has been automatically rest-ored and revived and th-eir membership will be continued for the remai-ning tenure as duly elected MLAs. They said that the Assembly website is still not showing Mr Venkata Reddy and Mr Sampath Kumar as MLAs and the protocol and privileges have not been extended so far.

The Congress leaders observed that the Chief Secretary of the state, Director General of Police and the Principal Secretary of Law and Legislature have not extended the protocol and privileges that are available to the sitting MLAs which reflects the autocratic behaviour of the state government.

After submitting the memorandums, the TPCC president spoke to mediapersons at the Raj Bhavan and TPCC working president Mallu Bha-tti Vikramarka at the Secretariat urging the TS government to resto-re the membership of the two expelled MLAs. They said that not implementing a High Court judgement amounts to contempt of court by the state government.

Mr Sampath Kumar, who accompanied the de-legation to Raj Bhavan, remained outside the Raj Bhavan.