Supreme Court: Notice issued on Andhra Pradesh Govt plea seeking division of assets with Telangana

The Supreme Court in the case State of AP v. UoI And Anr, wherein the bench comprising Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice M M Sundresh observed and has issued notices in a writ petition filed by the State of Andhra Pradesh for division of the assets and liabilities with the State of Telangana under the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act, 2014. Therefore, the the government of Andhra Pradesh filed the petition wherein seeking of a “fair, expeditious and equitable” division of assets and liabilities of the erstwhile State of Andhra Pradesh between the States of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, with regards to the terms of the Apportionment made under the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, 2014. During the previous hearing, it has been submitted by the senior counsel appearing for the state government before the bench comprising of Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice MM Sundresh that this was an extraordinary situation wherein the Act, thus, which clearly apportions everything, which is being brought in the year 2014. Before the Court, he had also urged that the issue needed to be resolved soon. Facts of the Case: In the case a writ petition was filed by the government of Andhra Pradesh which points out that not even a single institution specified in Schedule IX (91 institutions), Schedule X (142 institutions) and Institutions not mentioned in the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization Act, 2014 (12 institutions) which have been apportioned between the States following their reorganization in 2014. It has also been specified in the plea that the total amount of fixed assets which was to be divided by the institution is about Rs. 1,42,601 crores. Therefore, the plea states that Telangana would be the state that would be benefitted by the non-division of assets as 91% of these assets are in Hyderabad which has become the Capital City of Telangana. Further, the plea filed states that institutions being referred to in the petition perform various essential and basic functions such as, agriculture, education, medical services, dairy development, minority and backward class development, industrial development, infrastructure development, the social security etc. Accordingly, the court agreed to hear the plea in January.