Sit in courtroom corner, pay ₹1L fine, SC tells Rao

Would heavens have fallen if the relieving order [of Sharma] was implemented a day later and SC was taken into confidence? RANJAN GOGOI, CJI

NEWDELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday found the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) M Nageswara Rao guilty of contempt of court for disobeying its explicit order and transferring an officer probing alleged sexual abuse of inmates of a Bihar shelter home during his time as interim director of the agency.

A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi and justices LN Rao and Sanjeev Khanna imposed a fine of ~1 lakh on Rao, additional director at CBI, and sentenced him to sit in a corner of the court until it rose for the day. The bench rejected Rao’s defence that the transfer order was not “wilful disobedience” but an “error of judgement” on his part.

CBI’s additional legal advisor S Bhasuran was also found to have violated the court order because, in his legal opinion, he favoured joint director AK Sharma’s transfer without seeking the court’s prior approval.

Bhasuran advised the agency to get post-transfer approval from the top court. He was also fined ~1 lakh and ordered to a sit in a corner until the court rose tor the day.

“It this is not contempt, then what would it be?” the bench asked attorney general KK Venugopa, who put up a strong defence of Rao and Bhasuran. Venugopal said the two committed a “serious mistake” but not wilfully so.

“I do not think it’s a case where they should be punished. It is very clear that it was not wilful,” the AG said.

Rao, a 1986 batch Odisha cadre IPS officer, was made interim director of CBI after Alok Verma was asked to go on leave on the intervening night of October 23-24 over an increasingly public feud with his deputy Rakesh Asthana, with whom he traded allegations of corruption.