In the contempt of court case, the Supreme Court issued directions to the government.

Tamil Nadu: The Madras High Court has advised the Tamil Nadu government in a contempt of court case not to cite election work as an excuse for failing to implement the High Court’s order.

In a petition filed by Rajkumar in the Chennai High Court, he stated that his name was included in the 2007 list for promotion to the post of Deputy Tahsildar in the Revenue Department. He had requested that his name be included in the 2006 promotion list. The High Court, hearing the case, ordered that the petitioner’s name be included in the 2006 promotion list within 12 weeks. An order was also issued last March to provide him with the appropriate financial benefits. The government has not implemented this order.

Following this, Rajkumar filed a contempt of court case in the Chennai High Court. The case came up for hearing before a bench of Chief Justice M.M. Srivastava and Justice G. Arulmurugan. The judges, who heard the case, noted that they had already granted a three-month extension for implementing the order.

They then questioned why the order was still not being implemented even after six months had passed. The government stated that the order could not be implemented due to election work. The judges refused to accept this, stating that election work should not be cited as a reason for failing to implement a High Court order.

The amount to be paid to the petitioner is very small. What difficulty does the government face in implementing that order? If Supreme Court orders are not implemented in this manner, there is no option but to impose punishment under the Contempt of Courts Act. They warned that if the order is not implemented within two weeks, a strict order will be issued.

Furthermore, the High Court stated that the government could either seek more time to implement the order or appeal against the order. If neither of these steps is taken, the Chief Secretary will be directed to instruct the officials to implement the order, and the hearing will be adjourned for four weeks.