KOCHI: The Kerala High Court sent a letter to the state government asking not to deduct the salary of judges in the wake of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic. This letter was at a time when the state government decided to defer six-day salary of government employees for every month for the next five months.

The high court registrar general had sent a letter to the finance secretary on Monday requesting to exempt the chief justice and other judges from the salary cut.

The judges have constitutional rights and so their salary should not be deducted, the letter mentioned. Meantime, the letter has not stated anything about the salary of other employees.

Service organisations had earlier approached the high court against the government order on salary cut. Following that, the court had temporarily stayed the order on Tuesday. However, the government’s move is to enforce salary cut through an ordinance. It was in between this, the high court’s letter was publicised.