The Andhra Pradesh State government’s special leave petition (SLP) on AP high court order took a new turn on Tuesday. Chief Justice of India, Justice U U Lalith recused himself from hearing the case in the Supreme Court on Tuesday.

Justice Lilith gave a piece of advice to Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy on Amaravati in 2014. Senior advocate arguing for the Amaravati farmers recalled this when the bench took up the case for hearing.

Reacting to this, Justice Lalit wondered when he gave advice to Jagan Mohan Reddy on Amaravati. It was then the advocate presented the copy of his advice to the bench which Justice Lilith examined.

Then the chief justice recused himself from hearing of the case. He transferred the case to another constitution bench. He did not consider the request of the advocate for the farmers to fix the date for the next hearing.

The state government had written a letter to the Supreme Court requesting for early hearing. Following this, the chief justice posted the case to November 1 from the original date of November 14, following a letter from the Andhra Pradesh government to speed up the hearing. The state government also complained against the Andhra Pradesh high court order on the Amaravati case, where the court directed the government to develop the plots in three months and build the capital city in six months.

The state government also complained to the Supreme Court that the AP High Court had questioned the legislative rights of the government and wanted the Supreme Court to look into these issues.

The state government, which is in a hurry to move to Visakhapatnam, had requested the Supreme Court to dispose of the case at the earliest. Following this, the Supreme Court posted the case to November 1.