HC rulings give hope to officials in Jagan case
Apex court too concurred with HC on acquitting IAS officer Ratna Prabha
Consistent rulings of the Hyderabad High Court in cases pertaining to involvement of senior government servants, more particularly civil service officers, in corruption cases or in other offences, has raised the hopes of the IAS officers charged in the illegal investments case of Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, of getting a clean chit.
The High Court has already given a clean chit to Ms Ratna Prabha, IAS, by quashing criminal proceedings initiated against her by the Central Bureau of Investigation.
The Supreme Court concurred with the findings of the High Court in the Ratna Prabha case, that discharging government functions does not come under the ambit of criminal breach of trust or cheating.
The CBI in its charge sheet against Ms Ratna Prabha alleged that she had extended undue favours to Indu Tech Pvt Ltd in allotting land when she was secretary to the IT and communication department during the regime of Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy.
She was charged under IPC Sections 120 (B) (criminal conspiracy), 409 (criminal breach of trust) and 420 (cheating) and also Sections 9, 11, 12, 13(2) r/w. Section 13(1)(c) & (d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.
Ms Prabha challenged the special court’s order in the High Court contending that she had discharged her duties after duly following the instructions of the government under Article 311 of the Constitution and also the Business Rules and the Secretariat Instructions.
Accepting her plea, the High Court quashed the charges holding that they were baseless and that there was no prima facie case made against her.
The High Court noted that the signatures of the chief secretary were very much available on the note file and in fact the petitioner had forwarded the note file before the Cabinet after incorporating the notes of the finance department.
The High Court said that the petitioner could not be found at fault, as it was the duty of the government either to approve or disapprove of a decision placed before it in due process.
The CBI has charged eight IAS officers — B.P. Acharya, Manmohan Singh, Y. Srilakshmi, M. Samuel, Aditya Nath Das, K. Ratna Prabha and B. Sam Bob in the case involving Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy.
The High Court had stayed criminal proceedings against Mr Sam Bob pending before the special CBI court of the city
The CBI named Sam Bob, the then principal secretary (industries and commerce department), as an accused with regard to the memorandum of agreement (MoA) signed with Lepakshi Knowledge Hub.
The HC also granted stay on all further proceedings pending against IAS officer B.P. Acharya.
The CBI charged Mr Acharya as an accused in three cases of allotting lands to Hetero, Aurbindo Pharma and Trident Life Sciences, by allegedly entering into a criminal conspiracy with other accused in the case to extend undue favours to the companies.
Adityanath Das has also got interim relief from the High Court. The CBI has charged Mr Das with extending undue favours to India Cements by allotting water to its cement plants in Ranga Reddy and Krishna districts from the Kagna and Krishna rivers when he was principal secretary to the irrigation department of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh.