HYDERABAD: Telangana is one step closer to attaining a functional State Human Rights Commission (SHRC) of it own as the State government has issued a GO declaring the constitution of a separate SHRC from Andhra Pradesh. Until now, the AP SHRC was catering to both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, taking cases of human rights violations from both areas.
However, with the new GO, the state will now have its own dedicated SHRC which will have to perform functions assigned to it under the Protection of Human Rights Act. Ironically, though the State managed to get its own commission after five years of bifurcation, it continues to be headless, with no appointments made to the post of chairperson. While the former chairperson retired in 2017, the members on the commission also retired one by one, leaving no one on the panel.
Even when it was a combined SHRC, both AP and TS shied away from appointing anyone for the SHRC after the last member retired on October 2018. This left nearly 4,408 running cases, and another 5,843 fresh cases in the lurch, with their status still under ‘pending’.
However, officials note there is a likelihood that these appointments may come before December 20, which is the deadline given by the Telangana High Court to set up a full fledged SHRC. The Court last week had given this deadline based on a PIL filed by an activist.