Hyderabad: An additional chief metropolitan magistrate at the Nampally court on Friday refused to hear a private petition filed by a former woman corporator against a number of Congress leaders including Telangana Congress’ AICC in-charge Meenakshi Natarajan on grounds of jurisdiction. Meenakshi’s nomination papers for a Rajya Sabha seat were rejected by a returning officer in Madhya Pradesh because she had not mentioned this case in her affidavit.During the hearing, advocates of the Congress leaders argued that the case should have been heard by the special court for MLAs and MPs as four of the seven respondents were either sitting or former public representatives. These included MLA C Parnika Reddy, MLC and Telangana Congress chief Mahesh Kumar Goud, former Lok Sabha MP Meenakshi and state minister Vakati Srihari.After hearing the arguments, the court returned the petition and asked the complainant to approach the appropriate court.Advocate Sama Sunil Reddy, who represented Meenakshi and Srihari told TOI, “It was a mistake on part of the returning officer to reject Meenakshi’s nomination papers. The private petition had been filed but the court was yet to take cognisance of it. Meenakshi was just a respondent and not an accused.”The private petition was filed in Aug 2025 by the former corporator accusing a Congress leader from Narayanpet in Telangana of sexual misconduct. It mentioned that two police cases had been registered against the leader — one in Hyderabad’s Panjagutta police station and another in Bengaluru’s Cubbon Park police station. The complainant alleged that she had raised the issue with senior Congress leaders, including Meenakshi and Goud, but no action had been taken.The complainant had asked the court to make the respondents pay Rs 10 crore as compensation besides punishing them for their inaction. She had made the Narayanpet leader the prime respondent.
