Hyderabad totally deserted for survey

August 19, 2014

Hyderabad, Aug 19: Hyderabad and all towns in Telangana went totally deserted Tuesday with the state government declaring a holiday to enable people to remain at home and participate in the household survey.

The usually busy roads in Hyderabad were empty as public transport and even autorickshaws went off the roads.

Government offices, educational institutions, shops, petrol bunks, hotels, cinema halls and all other business establishments were shutdown as the government warned the private institutions of action for violating holiday orders. It exempted only emergency services.

Many information technology companies, however, were open as their managements expressed inability to declare a holiday. The global IT/ITES companies said their employees can still get enumerated as they will be having different shifts.

Information Technology minister K. Tarakarama Rao said the government had no objection as long as the employees participate in the survey.

As Hyderabad is a common capital of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Andhra Pradesh legislature, whose budget session began Monday, functioned as usual. Employees of Andhra Pradesh secretariat and other offices also worked.

The government has ordered Road Transport Corporation (RTC) not to ply a single bus across the state. Autorickshaws also stayed off the roads. People reaching at railway stations faced inconvenience. However, private cabs operated as usual.

The roads in busy areas like Khairatabad, Panjagutta, Ameerpet, Dilsukhnagar, Koti, Abids, Mehdipatnam and L. B. Nagar were completely deserted. Residents have termed the situation unprecedented as even the shutdowns called by political parties never evoked such a total response.

Adding to this, thousands of families residing in Hyderabad headed to the native places in other parts of Telangana to participate in the survey. Even the patients in government-run hospitals took permission to visit their homes for the enumeration.

Normal life also came to a standstill in Karimnagar, Warangal, Nizamabad, Khammam, Nalgonda, Mahabubnagar, Adilabad, Medak and other towns in the state.

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‘Pay the worker before his sweat dries’: Madras High Court cites Prophet Muhammad’s teaching while ordering settlement of dues

News Network

December 21,2025

Invoking the teachings of Prophet Muhammad—“pay the worker before his sweat dries”—the Madras High Court has directed a municipal corporation to settle long-pending legal dues owed to a former counsel. The court observed that this principle reflects basic fairness and applies equally to labour and service-related disputes.

Justice G. R. Swaminathan made the observation while hearing a petition filed by advocate P. Thirumalai, who claimed that the Madurai City Municipal Corporation failed to pay him legal fees amounting to ₹13.05 lakh. Earlier, the High Court had asked the corporation to consider his representation. However, a later order rejected a major portion of his claim, prompting the present petition.

The court allowed Thirumalai to approach the District Legal Services Authority (DLSA) and submit a list of cases in which he had appeared. It also directed the corporation to settle the verified fee bills within two months, without interest. The court noted that the petitioner had waited nearly 18 years before challenging the non-payment and that the corporation could not be fully blamed, as the fee bills were not submitted properly.

‘A Matter of Embarrassment’

Justice Swaminathan described it as a “matter of embarrassment” that the State has nearly a dozen Additional Advocate Generals. He observed that appointing too many law officers often leads to unnecessary allocation of work and frequent adjournments, as government counsel claim that senior officers are engaged elsewhere.

He expressed hope that such practices would end at least in the Madurai Bench of the High Court and added that Additional Advocate Generals should “turn a new leaf” from 2026 onwards.

‘Scandalously High Amounts’

While stating that the court cannot examine the exact fees paid to senior counsel or law officers, Justice Swaminathan stressed that good governance requires public funds to be used prudently. He expressed concern over the “scandalously high amounts” paid by government and quasi-government bodies to a few favoured law officers.

In contrast, the court noted that Thirumalai’s total claim was “a pittance” considering the large number of cases he had handled.

Background

Thirumalai served as the standing counsel for the Madurai City Municipal Corporation for more than 14 years, from 1992 to 2006. During this period, he represented the corporation in about 818 cases before the Madurai District Courts.

As the former counsel was unable to hire a clerk to obtain certified copies of judgments in all 818 cases, the court directed the District Legal Services Authority to collect the certified copies within two months. The court further ordered the corporation to bear the cost incurred by the DLSA and deduct that amount from the final settlement payable to the petitioner.

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