Taking suo motu congnizance of media reports that the hands of two migrant labourers were chopped off in Odisha, the Supreme Court Monday issued notice to the state government and also to Andhra Pradesh, where the contractor who hired them was based.
The notice is returnable in four weeks.
The bench of Chief Justice P. Sathasivam and Justice Ranjan Gogoi took cognizance of a news report on the two labourers who were allegedly subjected to the barbaric act for their refusal to comply with the wishes of the contractor who hired them.
An Andhra Pradesh-based labour contractor and his four henchmen allegedly chopped off the hands of the two workers in December 2013 after they refused to work in a brick kiln in Chhattisgarh.