The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a plea challenging the decisions of the Telangana and Andhra Pradesh governments to relax working hours for Muslim government employees by one hour during the Ramzan month..A Bench of Chief Justice of India Sanjiv Khanna and Justice PV Sanjay Kumar stated that the top court would not entertain the petition and asked the petitioner, one M Raghu, to approach the respective High Courts..Andhra Pradesh and Telangana had announced that Muslim employees could leave workplace an hour early during Ramzan. According to the Telangana government circular issued on February 15, all Muslim government employees, including teachers, contract and outsourcing staff and employees in statutory boards, corporations and public sector undertakings would be allowed to leave office at 4 pm from March 2 to March 31..A similar order was passed by the Andhra Pradesh government on February 11. .Senior Advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for the petitioner, argued that "if this is allowed for one faith then it will soon become a race to the bottom.".The plea filed through advocate Sanjana Saddy stated that the circular was ex facie unconstitutional as it creates an unreasonable classification based solely on religion, thereby violating the fundamental right to equality guaranteed under Article 14 of the Constitution of India. "While the State possesses the authority to make reasonable classifications, such classifications must satisfy the twin tests of (i) intelligible differentia and (ii) rational nexus with a legitimate objective. The impugned circular fails to meet these requirements, as it arbitrarily confers a religiously motivated concession to a specific group without any rational nexus to administrative efficiency or public interest," the plea said.
