BENGALURU: The Karnataka High Court rejected a petition filed by an accused, seeking direction to the judge of the special court for NIA cases to affix his signature or put his initials on each page of the case diary of cases registered by the National Investigating Agency (NIA) on every occasion, when it brought to the court by the investigating officer and taken back.
Justice M Nagaprasanna dismissed the petition filed by Mohammed Shiyab, native of Sullia taluk of Dakshina Kannada district, who is accused No. 8 in the murder of RSS activist Praveen Nettaru in Mangaluru in July 2022.
Referring to the law laid down by the Supreme Court that the intention of the legislature cannot be whittled by court in an exercise to reframe the legislation, as courts are not conferred with such power, the high court said that if the petitioner’s prayer is accepted, it would run foul of those principles elucidated by the apex court.
In effect, the petitioner is asking the court to reframe legislation by adding the words that the magistrate should affix his signature on every page of the case diary, while it is not the mandate of the statute, the court said.
The petitioner submitted that several states, in their respective Criminal Rules of Practice, mandate that the case diary at every point in time, be signed by the judge of the court.
The High Court said, that would not enure to the benefit of the petitioner to seek a direction that the same practice should be followed in Karnataka, notwithstanding no such mandate existing in the Criminal Rules of Practice, 1968 of the state.