Poachgate: Investigation cannot be handed over to CBI right now, says HC

Hyderabad: The Telangana High Court on Friday, hearing writ appeals filed by the state government challenging the decision to transfer the BRS MLAs poaching case to the Central Bureau of Investigation, said as the court is hearing the batch of appeals filed by the state, the investigation cannot be handed over to the CBI.

On Friday evening, Gade Praveen Kumar, the deputy solicitor general, representing the CBI, informed the Telangana High Court Division Bench headed by Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan and Justice N. Tukaramji that he wanted to file some papers in this batch of cases to the court.

Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan made it clear that as the court is adjudicating the cases, as of now CBI cannot come into the picture.

Banda Shivananda Prasad, advocate general, informed the court that the CBI is asking the chief secretary to hand over the files pertaining to the BRS MLAs poaching case to the agency.

Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan, responding to the contention of the AG, reiterated his decision that as the court is hearing the batch of appeals filed by the state, as of now the CBI cannot take over the investigation.

On Friday, D.V.V Seetharama Murthy, senior counsel appearing for the three accused in the poaching case, pointed out that the entire episode was a meticulous and pre-planned trap laid by the Telangana police. All audio and videos showing a conversation between Pilot Rohith Reddy and the three accused were handed over to the highest functionary of the state, the CM, who in turn sent it to the media, branding the three accused—Nandu Kumar, Ramchander Bharati, and Simhyaji—as accused prior to the commencement of the investigation, he said.

As the entire episode is pre-planned, the intention of the state is to malign the three accused, he added.

Ravichander, senior counsel appearing for one of the three accused, informed the court that the ACB Hyderabad court had dismissed the memo filed by SIT arraying B.L Santosh and three others as accused. He pointed out that when the SIT preferred a criminal revision case against that order of ACB, a High Court Single Judge Bench dismissed the criminal revision case, which clearly establishes that this entire case is on the criminal jurisdiction side.

When a Single Judge Bench of the High Court has dismissed the criminal revision case filed by SIT, how can the Division Bench (CJ court) entertain the writ appeals filed by the state? the senior counsel asked.

Meanwhile, Damodar Reddy, senior counsel appearing for Telangana BJP general secretary G. Premender Reddy, whose writ petition seeking a CBI probe was dismissed by Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy, read out a list of 37 MLAs belonging to the Congress, BSP, and other parties who switched over to TRS (now BRS) between 2014–2022.

BRS has resorted to the poaching of MLAs of other parties and now it comes before the court and says BJP is poaching its four MLAs, contended the senior counsel.

AG B.S Prasad sought an adjournment till 9 January for submission of a rejoinder to the contentions raised by the counsels representing the three accused in the Court.

Accordingly, the CJ adjourned the batch of writ appeals to 9 January.