As per the latest reports, counsels representing the State in its appeal against the transfer of the MLA poaching case argued in the High Court on Thursday that the Special Investigation Team constituted by the State government had committed no error in its investigation, and that the single judge’s order transferring the investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation and quashing the SIT was ‘unsustainable’.
The Telangana High Court’s two-judge panel, comprised of Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan and Justice N Tukaramji, who heard Supreme Court senior counsel Dushyant Dave representing Telangana State in the case on Thursday, adjourned the case to Friday for further hearing.
The State had filed an appeal against the single judge’s order transferring the investigation into the MLA poaching case to the CBI.
Dave said that while the writ court has broad jurisdiction, the matter was handled by a single judge in a narrow scope. He stated that evidence leakage was a reason for suspecting the investigation. The Chief Minister’s press conference on November 3 was held after the case was registered and evidence was submitted to the court in the last week of October, Dave pointed out, and said once the material was placed before a court, it became public document.
As Chief Minister, it was his responsibility to bring to the attention of millions of voters the undemocratic acts committed by the Bharatiya Janata Party in order to destabilise and dethrone the Bharat Rashtra Samithi government.
When the BJP has a track record of destabilising eight state governments, the state’s ruling party cannot be expected to remain silent on the issue, said Dave. Other Chief Ministers held press conferences when the BJP attempted to destabilise their governments, he said, adding that the Telangana Chief Minister had reached out to the people of India through the media and there was nothing wrong with that.
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Dave also stated that the court lacked the authority to stop the investigation. Furthermore, only the BJP and the accused had requested that the investigation be transferred. The SIT, which was made up of independent and high-ranking officers, had made no mistakes, but the judge went so far as to quashing the SIT constitution without there being any pleading.
Cases cannot be transferred to the CBI without the ratification of the State and it was well established that investigations could only be transferred in the rarest of rare cases, Dave argued.
The SIT was operating on its own. He argued that the single judge’s narrow approach in transferring the investigation, quashing the SIT, and the investigation based on evidence leakage by the Chief Minister was unsustainable and that it was well established that there was an attempt to destabilise the ruling party through the trap laid by the police. The reasons for transferring the investigation were ‘bad in law,’ he claimed.
Senior Counsel Gandra Mohan Rao, who represents complainant Pilot Rohit Reddy, stated that the complainant was threatened to join the BJP or face the Enforcement Directorate and the CBI.
The ED was already behind him, and now the investigation has been transferred to the CBI, raising serious concerns, he said, emphasising that the right to a fair investigation did not apply only to the accused, but also to the victims and complainant.
Senior counsel for the three main accused in the case, DV Seetharam Murthy, made submissions in support of the single judge’s order. He stated that the judge issued the order only after reasonable satisfaction about the apprehension of an unfair investigation. The judge had rightly exercised criminal jurisdiction in a writ petition by quashing the proceedings of investigation and argued that when such jurisdiction was exercised, the State has to appeal only in the Supreme Court and not in the High Court.
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