Judge Quddusi moves court over call records ‘leak’

NEW DELHI: Former Orissa high court judge IM Quddusi on Wednesday moved a court seeking an investigation into the alleged leakage of transcripts of telephone conversations between him and two other accused that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) recorded in the medical college bribery scam.

“The court has sought the CBI’S response on the application on January 22,” Quddusi’s lawyer Vijay Aggarwal said.

Quddusi has said in his application filed before special CBI judge Manoj Jain that an inquiry is needed to see whether it is a case of criminal misconduct or that of theft of agency documents, which are confidential in nature.

The case against Quddusi is one of the issues that has become the point of contention among the top judges of the Supreme Court. Quddusi and others were arrested last year on charges of graft. Later a Delhi court granted bail to Quddusi.

An inquiry must be held to find out about the erring officials, his lawyer said. “We also want an inquiry to check any tampering with documents or conversations.” Quddusi said monitoring the investigation is essential to ensure it does not become a “trial by media” and to see the administration of justice is not compromised by interference by third parties in the investigation.

The CBI said in the FIR that Quddusi and his alleged associate, Bhawana Pandey, assured representatives of the Prasad Education Trust, which runs the Prasad Institute of Medical Sciences in Lucknow, they would get a favourable judgment through connections in Supreme Court.

The medical institute is among 46 colleges barred by the government from admitting students for the next few years . The duo then allegedly got in touch with a person called Biswanath Agrawala from Bhubaneswar, who claimed to be in close contact with senior public functionaries.