Telangana High Court on Thursday issued notices to the State government in a PIL petition seeking a direction to set aside appointment of B. Janak Prasad and S. Narasimha Reddy as chairman and member respectively of the Telangana State Wage Advisory Board. 

A bench of Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice P. Sam Koshy instructed the government to respond within four weeks over the points raised in the petition challenging issuance of GO 443 appointing the board chairman and member. The petitioner Ganji Raju’s counsel Chikkudu Prabhakar contended that their appointment was made in violation of Section 8 (2) and 9 of the Minimum Wages Act 1948. It was also against the spirit of Articles 14, 19 and 21 of the Constitution. 

According to him, the chairman and members of the wage board should be independent members. They should not hold position in any other office, he argued. While Janak Prasad was the secretary general of the Singareni Coal Mines Labour Union (affiliated to the INTUC) and official spokesperson of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee, S. Narasimha Reddy was the vice-president of the same union. 

Their appointment should be declared arbitrary and illegal, the counsel said.