Updated: November 25, 2020 5:41:15 pm
A 2019 photo of an unfinished government building in Amaravati.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday held a Andhra Pradesh High Court order to restrict media to denounce an FIR filed by the AP’s anti-corruption office against a former legal officer and others for the purchase of land in Amaravati.
“The HC of Andhra Pradesh will not decide until the end of January the matter related to alleged irregularities in the land transaction in Amaravati,” said a bank headed by Judge Ashok Bhushan. The superior court approved the order while listening to a appeal filed by the government of Andhra Pradesh against the order of September 15 of the Superior Court.
A bench of Chief Justice JK Maheshwari of the Andhra HC had ordered that there should be no coercive measures in support of the FIR presented by agents of the Guntur Police Station of the Anti-Corruption Bureau. The court also “suspended” the “investigation” and ordered that news regarding the FIR “not be made public in any electronic, print or social media …”
After coming to power in the 2019 Assembly elections, the government of Jagan Mohan Reddy had formed a 10-member SIT headed by IPS officer K Raghuram Reddy to investigate alleged wrongdoing in projects started by the previous Telugu Party government. Desam from 2014 to 2019, including land. acquisition in Amaravati.
During the video conference hearing, lead attorney Rajeev Dhavan, who appeared for the Andhra Pradesh government, argued that the High Court could not have said that no investigation should be carried out in the case. “What is special about this request? The essence of this case is bad faith, but where it is reflected in the petition, ”said the senior defender.
“There is evidence in the complaint and it is divided into pages and pages. Now why would farmers buy land in June and July and sell it in January? Now I wonder if these types of complaints should be investigated or not. There were a series of transactions and whether or not it should be investigated, ”he said.
Taking note of their submissions, the court observed: “We are of the opinion that the matter requires consideration and therefore we will issue a notice.”
Lead attorney Mukul Rohatgi, who appeared on behalf of former attorney general Dammalapati Srinivas, said: “It is absurd to say that someone had prior knowledge that the state was taking the land for capital. It is public knowledge when such plans arise. “
“It’s worse than an emergency,” Rohatgi said, adding: “It’s easier to target someone, but it’s hard to build a reputation. A lawyer was attacked because he was the attorney general of the previous government ”.
Lead attorney Harish Salve, who also appeared on behalf of the former attorney general, said that if the order was that wrong, then the state should have gone back to the HC and asked for the order to be vacated. “The order was approved in September and it is now November, but so far no response has been submitted,” he said. Salve also said that accusations were made against the judges of the high court on social media.
In its argument before the Supreme Court, YS Jagan Mohan Reddy’s government had called HC’s order “drastic”. Representing the state government, leading advocate Dushyant Dave had noted that the decision to form an SIT was made after a December 2019 report from a cabinet subcommittee. He further said that the Supreme Court had been of the constant opinion that “higher courts cannot interfere in the investigation phase.”
In the midst of this, CM Jagan Mohan Reddy wrote to the Chief Justice of India SA Bobde, claiming that Justice NV Ramana, next in line to be the CJI, “has been influencing the High Court sessions (of Andhra Pradesh), including the list of some honorable judges ”.
The CM’s eight-page letter also referred to Judge Ramana’s alleged “proximity” to the TDP leader and former Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu, as the Anti-Corruption Office investigation into “questionable land transactions” involved two daughters. of Judge Ramana and others in Amaravati, before the site of the new state capital was declared.
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