The state public prosecutor in Andhra Pradesh has issued legal notices to the management of Andhra Jyothy newspaper for publishing defamatory news against two District Collectors. The notice has been sent to the Managing Director of the publication Vemuri Radha Krishna, publisher Koganti Venkata Seshagiri Rao and editor K Srinivas.
The notice was issued with regard to an article published in the Andhra edition of the paper on Sunday, titled, ‘Honey Trap! Iddaru Collectorla Kahani’ (Honey Trap! Two Collectors’ Story). The story accuses two unnamed District Collectors — one from the Coastal region and one from Rayalaseema — of inappropriate behaviour with women colleagues. The legal notice demanded that Andhra Jyothy publish an unconditional apology over the “defamatory article.”
Public prosecutor K Srinivas Reddy, on behalf of all the District Collectors in Andhra Pradesh, wrote that his client was aggrieved with the “defamatory, derogatory and venomous” news “devoid of truth.” The notice also called the contents of the article “libellous, scandalous, untruthful, unfounded,” and said that it was published to promote a selfish agenda and to suit “vested political alignments.”
The article had alleged that a collector from Coastal Andhra, a sincere and modest officer, had been ‘trapped’ by a notorious female official working at a government department in the same district. The article says that the woman is known to get corrupt work done, and that she had been used to “trap” the Collector — who might be getting transferred soon, as he was involved in doing favours for private parties through the woman.
The second unnamed Collector, from Rayalaseema, is accused of behaving inappropriately with women officials. The article said that the Collector has been criticised for his behaviour several times, and he would often dine, travel and attend meetings with a woman official, creating a controversy. It said that he even tried to get her to divorce her husband, and while that particular official was transferred elsewhere, his objectionable behaviour has continued with other women working for the government, the article says.
The legal notice called the article “a scathing attack on the respected official branch of the Executive Bureaucracy in India.” It said that the Collectors felt “the tone and tenor of the report is such that it is potential enough to mislead the common man into believing that the institution of Collectors is a worthless avocation,” and that it was written “in gross violation of the principles of journalism” with mala fide intention. It was also noted that the report was “devoid of quotations from persons of repute to buttress its stand.