HYDERABAD: In a significant development in the YSR Congress president YS Jagan Mohan Reddy attack case, a division bench of the Hyderabad High Court on Tuesday directed the State police not to file the charge-sheet before the lower court concerned until further orders.
While directing the Centre and the State government to place full details on the issue before the court, the bench issued notices to the Secretary, Ministry of Home Affairs, Principal Secretaries, Home, and DGPs of both AP and Telangana, Visakhapatnam City Police Commissioner and SHO of Town V police station to respond.
Making it clear that the petitions filed before it would not be any obstacle to the ongoing SIT probe into the incident, the bench directed the investigating officials to submit their report in a sealed cover on the progress made in the investigation by next date of hearing.
The bench comprising Chief Justice TBN Radhakrishnan and Justice SV Bhatt was passing this order on the petition filed by Jagan seeking probe into the attack on him by any appropriate independent agency, not under the control of the AP government. The bench was also dealing with a petition filed by YSR Congress, represented by party's political affairs committee member and former MP YV Subba Reddy, and PIL filed by Anil Kumar and Amarnath Reddy seeking CBI probe into security lapses at the Visakhapatnam airport where the attack took place. The bench felt the need for a detailed hearing of the petitions.
When the matter came up for hearing, AP Advocate General Dammalapati Srinivas placed the status report of the SIT probe before the court. After perusing the report, the bench posed some questions to clear its doubts on the contents mentioned in it.
Senior counsel CV Mohan Reddy, appearing for Jagan, contended that the statements made by the State Chief Minister and DGP would influence the SIT probe. They made statements terming the attack as a publicity stunt and was intended to gain political sympathy. Even the council of ministers headed by the chief minister made similar statements on the incident. Whenever statements were made impacting the court proceedings courts should intervene to prevent such activities, he added and urged the HC to order a probe by any appropriate independent agency to unearth the facts.
Another senior counsel D Prakash Reddy, appearing for YSR Congress party represented by YV Subba Reddy, submitted that there was no scope for an impartial enquiry in view of statements made by the CM and DGP. "The victim has a right to seek an impartial enquiry," he added.
Disputing the submissions, the AP AG said that the chief minister had tried to explain the facts to the people on the incident as there was scope for law and order problem. In fact, there were large-scale protests by the leaders of the opposition party immediately after the attack, he noted.
After hearing both sides, the bench said that there was a need to have an in-depth hearing of the case. The bench issued notices to all the respondents except CM Naidu.
During the course of the hearing, the bench wondered why some of the CCTV cameras at the airport were not functional. While impleading the CISF IG and assistant commandant, Visakhapatnam Airport's Director, Chief Security Officer and manager of the Airport Authority of India as respondents.