A Division Bench of the High Court of Andhra Pradesh, comprising Justices A.V. Sesha Sai and R. Raghunandan Rao, on September 6 heard a PIL petition filed by Chinta Venkateswarlu, a retired railway employee from Vijayawada city, against the nomination of Samineni Udayabhanu (YSR Congress Party’s Jaggaiahpet MLA), P. Sarath Chandra Reddy and Kethan Desai as members of the Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) Trust Board.
The court issued notices to the Endowments Commissioner and the TTD Executive Officer for counters by September 13, to which date the PIL was posted for further hearing.
The petitioner’s contention was that the nominees had a criminal record, and making them members of the TTD Trust Board was in contravention of Sections 18 and 19 of the A.P. Charitable and Hindu Religious Institutions And Endowments Act, 1987, and No. 8 of the A.P. Charitable And Hindu Religious Institutions and Endowments Appointment Of Trustees Rules, 1987.
Advocate J. Shravan Kumar stated in the petition that Mr. Udayabhanu had 10 criminal cases pending against him, and all of them were serious in nature. He further said that Mr. Sarath Chandra Reddy, a close relative of a YSR Congress Party leader, was an accused in the Delhi liquor scandal case, and had been recently released from jail, and Mr. Desai was removed as president of the Medical Council of India (MCI) upon directions by the Delhi High Court on corruption charges.
Their appointment as members of the TTD Trust Board was motivated by political considerations, and no rule of law was followed in the process, the petitioner alleged, praying for setting aside the impugned G.O. Ms. No. 406 dated August 25, 2023.
