IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) WEDNESDAY, THE TWENTY SEVENTH DAY OF FEBRUARY TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE DR JUSTICE G.YETHIRAJULU WRIT PETITION NO : 34270 of 1997 Between: G.K.Durga Devi, W/o. M.Raghavendra Rao, R/o. Tadepalligudem, West Godavari District ..... PETITIONER AND The General Manager, Telecom District, West Godavari District, Eluru. .....RESPONDENT Petition under Article 226 of the constitution of India praying that in the circumstances stated in the Affidavit filed herein the High Court will be pleased to issue a writ, order or direction particularly one in the nature of a writ of mandamus declaring the Telephone Bill dated 1-3- 1997 claiming an heavy of Rs. 11,622/- towards the consumption charges is illegal, arbitrary, erroneous and further declare that disconnecting the telephone connection of telephone No. 21902 without following the prescribed procedure is illegal, arbitrary and erroneous and against the rules and consequently direct the respondent to issue reconnection to the telephone No. 21902 and pass Counsel for the Petitioner: MR.Y.V.RAVI PRASAD Counsel for the Respondent No.: SMT.D.S.R.KRISHNA The Court made the following : THE HON’BLE Dr. JUSTICE G.YETHIRAJULU WRIT PETITION NO : 34270 of 1997 O R D E R: This writ petition is filed by the petitioner seeking to declare that the telephone bill dated 01-03-1997 for Rs.11,622/- towards telephone consumption charges is illegal and arbitrary. The petitioner is a legal practitioner at Tadepalligudem and is a category-1 consumer. She contended that her telephone bill never exceeded more than Rs.2,000/- but surprisingly she received a telephone bill dated 01-03-1997 for Rs.11,622/-. Immediately she addressed a letter to the concerned authorities, but they did not give any reply and did not made any enquiry as the bill amount is exorbitant to the earlier bills issued to her and therefore she requested to set aside the same. The respondents filed a counter affidavit giving details of the numbers, long distance calls and duration of the calls emanated from the telephone of the petitioner and the learned counsel for the respondents submitted that a subsequent bill issued for Rs.6,000/- was paid by the petitioner without any objection and the record discloses that in view of the long distance calls made by the petitioner for long time, the department was constrained to issue the impugned bill. Therefore, there was no error in calculating the amount or assessing the bill. In the light of the submissions made by the respondent’s counsel, I do not find any justification to set aside the bill. Therefore, the writ petition is dismissed. However, the petitioner is at liberty to approach the arbitrator, if she is still aggrieved by the telephone numbers referred in the counter to which she made calls. In the event of raising any arbitration, the arbitrator is at liberty to pass orders on the material available on record uninfluenced by the observations made by this Court. No costs. ______________________ G.YETHIRAJULU,J Date:27-02-2008 KLP