Telangana High Court quashes FIR against two civil judges in SC/ST Act case

The Telangana High Court recently quashed a first information report (FIR) against two Civil Judges in a decade-old case in which they faced charges under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989..The two judicial officers were accused of engaging in a tussle with their colleagues during their time at the Judicial Academy and allegedly using caste-based slurs against them.A Bench of Chief Justice Alok Aradhe and Justice J Sreenivas Rao said that the case seemed to be a counter blast filed in response to a complaint lodged by the two accused."It is pertinent to mention that respondent No.5 has lodged a complaint against the petitioners on 09.10.2015, subsequent to the report submitted by the Director, Andhra Pradesh Judicial Academy, Secunderabad, to the Registrar (Vigilance) basing upon the information/complaint of the petitioners and after conducting enquiry against respondent No.5 and Mr.S.Kalyan Chakravarthy. It clearly shows that respondent No.5 lodged a complaint against the petitioners maliciously as a counter blast and the same is clear abuse of process of law and the principle laid down in State of Haryana (supra) is squarely applicable to the present case," the Court said. .By way of background, the petitioners, appointed as Junior Civil Judges in 2013 and sent for judicial training in Bengaluru.Due to certain incidents that transpired in the hostel room, the petitioners submitted a written report to the Director, Judicial Academy narrating the entire incident.The said complaint was then forwarded to the High Court.Disciplinary proceedings followed, and after a departmental inquiry, the High Court of Judicature at Hyderabad decided in 2015 to impose the highest penalty and remove the respondent and others from service.Thereafter, the petitioners came to know that the respondent had filed a complaint against them. Based on this complaint, the first information report (FIR) was registered under Section 3(1)(x) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989. As a result, they filed the present plea..The Court observed that the FIR was lodged only after the order of removal was issued. Therefore, it concluded that the FIR, which was registered after a delay of two years, appeared to be a retaliation against the complaint made by the petitions.In view of that, the High Court quashed the FIR.Advocate N Naveen Kumar appeared for the petitioners.Government counsel Pottigari Sridhar Reddy appeared for the respondents..[Read Order]