Supreme Court Issues Notices To AP and Telangana Over Dairy Assets

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notices to both the States regarding the division of dairy assets between Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. Andhra Pradesh Dairy Development Cooperative Federation Limited (APDDCF) and the Telangana State Dairy Development Cooperative Federation (TSDDCF) had approached the Supreme Court challenging the directions given by the Telangana High Court which had impugned GO No 8 issued by the Telangana government.

The petitions were heard by a bench of Justices Justices Chandrachud, R. Subhash Reddy and Ravindra Bhat. According to the memo given by the Centre, the offices and assets located in an area will belong to that State in particular, counsels V. Giri and Venkat Reddy who were arguing on behalf of Telangana state contended.

Contrary to the Centre's memo, they said that the Telangana High Court’s order to assign an office in Somajiguda to the AP was not correct. Viswanathan, the counsel representing AP stated that the buildings at Lalapet should be allotted to the state of AP as it is a central location for the dairy sector.

 At this juncture, Justice Ravindra Bhat intervened and directed those respective state governments should look into the affairs of the dairy assets distribution and why should there any kind of mediation by them, he questioned. The Supreme Court bench issued notices to both the States after listening to the arguments and ordered for Counters to be filed within four weeks.

In March a division bench of Telangana High Court set aside GO 8 issued by the State government on May 6, 2016, which authorises the transfer of ownership of a milk product factory at Lalapet, other dairy buildings, and the Somajiguda guest house, which belong to the erstwhile APDDCF to the Telangana dairy board. 

The bench stated that administrative office, assets, and liabilities of erstwhile APDDCF should be shared between the two federations in the ratio 58.32: 41.68, as per proviso to Section 53(1)(b) of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014. The bench had directed the two dairy federations to take assistance from the Comptroller and Auditor General of India for market valuation of the Somajiguda guest house and assets and liabilities of operational units of the erstwhile AP Dairy board.

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