AP to speed up SIT probe into irregularities during TDP rule as Supreme Court sets aside HC stay

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‘Should have considered intention’

The bench also felt that the high court should have taken into consideration the Andhra Pradesh government’s intention to approach the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to probe the case as it had wider ramifications.

The Andhra Pradesh government issued the Government Order (GO) for the constitution of the SIT based on the report of a Cabinet Sub-Committee set up soon after the YSRCP government of Chief Minister YS Jagan Mohan Reddy came to power in the state, unseating the TDP regime.

The subcommittee’s report held that several irregularities — procedural, legal, and financial — took place, besides fraudulent transactions related to various projects.

The Supreme Court said that it appeared the high court did not understand the GOs for constituting the SIT and the Cabinet Sub-Committee as they did not amount to reversing the decisions of the previous government.

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SC vacates HC stay

The apex court issued orders vacating the high court’s stay, after hearing the arguments on the appeal preferred by the Andhra Pradesh government.

It said that the high court could continue to hear the case based on its merits.

The Supreme Court, while vacating the high court’s stay, considered as untenable the premise of the Andhra Pradesh High Court that the executive does not have any power to review the decisions taken by the previous government and order an investigation.

The Supreme Court also found unjustified the high court’s observation that GOs had a “bias” as there was political rivalry between the incumbent and erstwhile governments.

Related: Probe into irregularities during TDP rule throttled, AP tells SC

Probe into financial irregularities

The Andhra Pradesh High Court stayed the proceedings of the Cabinet Sub-Committee looking into the irregularities committed by the N Chandrababu Naidu-led TDP government, and the  probe by the SIT, on 16, September, 2020.

The fact-finding sub-committee was formed on 26 September, 2019, and the special probe team was constituted on 21 February, 2020.

During an earlier hearing, senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi, who represented the Andhra Pradesh government, questioned several aspects of the high court order.

“Where is the power of the state,” he asked. “It is the very throttling of the collection of facts and investigation,” he submitted before the bench of Justices Shah and Sundresh.

Singhvi referred to previous Supreme Court judgements, including one by Justice Shah, to augment his argument that the question of bias does not arise even if the complainant and the probe agency were the same.

He also cited that the state government had written to the Centre for a CBI probe into the allegations. The high court had referred to bias while quashing the government orders regarding the sub-committee and the probe team.

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Regime revenge

Senior Advocate Sidharth Dave, appearing for the defendant, TDP Politburo member Varla Ramaiah, termed the state government’s action as “regime revenge”. The Cabinet Sub-Committee was not a fact-finding panel but constituted to find out something to embroil the TDP regime in some cases, he contended.

The defence further submitted that the sub-committee comprised all state ministers, three Parliament members and a secretary. Its terms of reference were so wide and open-ended as if it included “everything under the sun”.

To a specific query by the bench, Dave replied that he was not against the fact-finding Cabinet Sub-Committee, but expressed apprehensions saying it was a fishing and roving inquiry.

AP to speed up probe

With the Supreme Court lifting the AP High Court’s stay order on SIT, the YSRCP government has decided to speed up the process of the investigation into the irregularities during the TDP regime.

AP government’s advisor Sajjala Ramakrishna Reddy told reporters on Wednesday that even arrests could take place in this case.

He said the government was bent on expediting the investigation of the SIT into the charges as early as possible.

Arguing that corruption at a very large scale had taken place during the previous regime, Ramakrishna Reddy said that the state government was determined to uncover the lurid details of the scams that had taken place in the past.

Hailing the vacation of the stay order by the Supreme Court, he said that an investigation had to be done if an erstwhile government had tried to harm the interests of the state with its policy decisions.

Ramakrishna Reddy also said that Chandrababu Naidu had a hand in the skill development scam and that a real-estate venture was named Amaravati and was projected as the capital of Andhra Pradesh. The idea behind the real-estate venture was to commit daylight robbery, he said.

“The erstwhile government cheated farmers after selling a dream of making mega bucks in return for surrendering their land under the land pooling scheme. Amaravati is the mother of all land scams in the country,” he said.