Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court Monday directed the department of youth services and sports to pay para swimming champion KS Vishwas more than Rs 1.2 lakh as a pending cash award and Rs 2 lakh in litigation costs.In a sharp rebuke to the department’s almost a decade-long delay, the court ruled that officials must personally bear the litigation costs.Vishwas, 36, had approached the court after multiple attempts to secure his entitled reward under a 2013 govt order had gone unanswered. Though he had applied in 2018 for Rs 6 lakh, the department stalled his claim, citing technicalities related to his association’s disqualification.Justice M Nagaprasanna dismissed this argument, noting that the cash award was tied to Vishwas’s international achievements — two silver and two bronze medals — not the status of his sporting association. The court also warned of a Rs 1,000 daily penalty if the Rs 1.2 lakh payment is not made within two weeks of receiving the order.“The focus must not be on bureaucratic technicalities, but on the living human spirit that triumphed against colossal odds. The govt’s duty is not merely administrative; it has to be moral, constitutional, and humane. When a man without arms dives into pools and emerges not just victorious but triumphant on the international stage, the state is expected to salute that spirit, not stifle his rights by red-tapism,” the court observed.
