The Telangana government’s ordinance to defer payment of salaries and pensions to the government employees faced hurdles in the High Court.

A petition was filed on Friday by retired DIFO Raman Goud who argued that the ordinance was illegal and against the spirit of the Constitution. Hearing the petition, the Telangana High Court has issued notices to the KCR government on Friday giving three weeks time to file its response.

On June 16, the Telangana High Court termed slashing of pensions by 25% and salaries by 75% illegal. The Telangana High Court had earlier directed the state government to file an affidavit and questioned the government’s rationale behind slashing the salaries and pensions.

The HC had observed that the Telangana government’s orders were not backed by any provision of the law. Following this, the Telangana government on June 17 promulgated an ordinance to defer payment of salaries and pensions to the government employees in view of dwindling revenues due to the corona imposed lockdown.

The KCR government had promulgated the Telangana Disaster and Public Health Emergency (Special Provisions) Ordinance 2020 that enables it to defer payments of monthly salaries, pension or remuneration to employees, pensioners. The ordinance was approved by Governor Tamilsai Soundarajan. As per the ordinance, the government can put off the payments of salaries and pensions to 50 per cent.

The Ordinance was promulgated after the state government employees and pensioners associations filed a petition in the High Court against the deferment of salaries and pensions. The ordinance will be applicable to all the institutions and statutory bodies that are being controlled by the state government such as universities, colleges, schools and other government institutions. As per the ordinance, the deferred amount should be payable in six months from the date of deferment