The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : Karunanidhi meets Chief Justice, discusses pending issues

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Jul 09, 2006

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Karunanidhi meets Chief Justice, discusses pending issues

A. Subramani

Finance and Law Ministers accompany the Chief Minister

CHENNAI: In an engagement at the highest level, the Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on Saturday drove to the residence of the Chief Justice of Madras High Court Justice A.P. Shah and discussed various issues pending with the government.

According to sources, the Chief Minister was accompanied by the Ministers of Finance and Law, whereas the judiciary was represented by Justices M. Karpagavinayagam, P. Sathasivam, Prafulla Kumar Misra and P.D. Dinakaran.

The agenda included the judiciary's long-felt demand for a five-storey building in the High Court premises here and construction of buildings for various sub courts and munsif courts, which are at present functioning from rented premises. The judges said all munsif and sub-courts in the State were also in need of photocopier and fax machines. Such equipment at District Judges court were obsolete and needed to be replaced.

Additional posts

The judges also said the State Government must create at least 350 additional staff posts in the Madras High Court. For this no fresh recruitment is needed as redeployment of staff from other departments and the State Administrative Tribunal that has been abolished could be considered.

The Chief Minister readily agreed to various demands. However, it was agreed that the court buildings project all of which would cost Rs.100 crore would be taken up in a phased manner. The Chief Justice suggested that the project could be spread out in such a manner that all the buildings would be ready in five years. He offered to nominate two judges to coordinate with the government or the ministers concerned for identifying and executing the project.

Another demand from the judicial side was air-conditioning of the Tamil Nadu State Judicial Academy and construction of a guesthouse there. It was reasoned that it would be a onetime investment that would avoid recurring expenditure on judicial officers on official visit to Tamil Nadu.

Mr. Karunanidhi also agreed to fix an inaugural date for the Tiruvallur court complex. According to sources, the meeting was in line with the set convention of the Chief Minister calling on the Chief Justice at the latter's residence if it pertained to official matters.

The members of the judiciary brought to the Chief Minister's notice that though Rs.3 crore was invested on the court press building and machinery in Madurai it was yet to become functional as the government had not sanctioned the required posts. In response the Chief Minister is understood to have said that the State Government would pass necessary orders at the earliest.

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