IN THE HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE, ANDHRA PRADESH AT HYDERABAD (Special Original Jurisdiction) WEDNESDAY, THE FIFTH DAY OF NOVEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND EIGHT PRESENT THE HON'BLE MS JUSTICE G.ROHINI WRIT PETITION NO : 24168 of 2008 Between: M/s. B. Seenaiah & Company (Projects Limited), Engineers & Contractors (Formerly) M/s. Kancherla Stone Crusher ISC No. 382, ' Marripadu Village, Sangam Mandal, Nellore District, Rep. by M. Prakasa Rao, Manager, Hyderabad Branch, Hyderabad. ..... PETITIONER AND 1 The Chief Engineer (O&M)/Zone/APSPDCL, Tiruchanur Road (Behind Sreenivasa Kalyana Mandapam) Tirupathi - 517 501, Chittoor District. 2 The Superintending Engineer, Operation, APSPDCL, Nellore. .....RESPONDENTS 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 any Writ, order or direction more particularly one in the nature of WRIT OF MANDAMUS, declaring that the inaction of the respondent No.1 is arbitrary, illegal and against the principles of natural justice in not passing the interim orders while receiving the appeal against the proceedings issued by the respondent No.2 vide Proceedings NO. SE/O/NLR/TF/D.No. 1341/08, dt. 22-9- 2008 and pass Counsel for the Petitioner: MR.O.KAILASHNATH REDDY Counsel for the Respondent No.: MR.O.MANOHER REDDY The Court made the following : THE HON’BLE Ms. JUSTICE G. ROHINI WRIT PETITION No. 24168 of 2008 O R D E R : The second respondent herein by order dated 22- 09-2008 called upon the petitioner to pay a sum of Rs.7,43,556.13 ps assessed towards back billing amount on the alleged detection of excess load by the petitioner. Aggrieved by the same, the petitioner states to have filed an appeal before the first respondent on 30-10-2008 along with an application for stay. Alleging that the ﬁrst respondent has not considered his appeal and no orders have been passed even on his application for stay and in the meanwhile, the service connection is likely to be disconnected since the 30 days time granted under the impugned order expires on 06-11-2008, the present writ petition is filed. I have heard the learned counsel for the petitioner as well as Sri O.Manohar Reddy appearing for the respondents. At the outset, it is to be noted that as per Section 172 (2) of the Electricity Act, 2003 (for short ‘the Act’), no appeal against an order of assessment under Section 127(2) of the Act shall be entertained unless the amount equal to 1/3rd of the assessed amount is deposited with the second respondent. The petitioner has not made such deposit, while preferring the appeal against the order of the second respondent. In the circumstances, though I am unable to held that the impugned action of the ﬁrst respondent is arbitrary and illegal, having regard to the facts and circumstances, I deem it appropriate to dispose of the writ petition permitting the petitioner to deposit 1/3rd of the amount assessed in the impugned order date 22-09-2008 with the Senior Accounts Oﬃcer, Central Oﬃce, Nellore within one week from today. On such deposit, the ﬁrst respondent shall consider the petitioner’s appeal and dispose of the same following due process of law. Till such time there shall be stay of disconnection of petitioner’s service connection on the basis of the impugned order. The writ petition is accordingly disposed of. No costs. ______________ G. ROHINI, J Date: 05-11-2008 Note: Issue C.C. by tomorrow. B/o KLP