Hyderabad, Aug. 26 -- A land dispute between two farmers in Shamirpet has ended up defining the limits of a specific route of appeal before the Telangana High Court, after a division bench ruled that an appeal seeking to effectively halt a criminal case cannot be filed under the "letters patent" mechanism, a colonial-era provision that lets a person appeal a single judge's order to a two-judge bench of the same court, but only within a defined set of circumstances.

Chief Justice Aparesh Kumar Singh and Justice GM Mohiuddin dismissed the appeal filed by 67-year-old farmer Kadannagari Babu, holding that what he was really asking for, which was a declaration wiping out the criminal case against him, amounted to seeking quashing of criminal ...