NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a petition by senior IAS officer Y Srilakshmi against a high court order cancelling her bail. She was arrested for her alleged role in the Obulapuram mining scam. A bench comprising Justice HL Dattu and Justice CK Prasad asked Srilakshmi to move the Court of the Special CBI Judge in Hyderabad dealing with the case for a regular bail. Senior advocate L Nageshwar Rao, appearing for the IAS officer, told the bench that she had already undergone imprisonment for 90 days and that the chargesheet had been filed. “I’ve come up against cancellation of bail by the High Court,” the counsel informed the bench.
To this, Justice Dattu told Nageshwar Rao, “You can go before the trial court and seek a regular bail.” In a brief order, Justice Dattu said, “The CBI filed supplementary chargesheet before the Special Judge, Hyderabad. In view of this development, we need not go into the correctness of the orders passed by the High Court dated January 2, 2012.
The trial court shall decide uninfluenced by any observations made by the High Court,” Justice Dattu added. The high court had cancelled the bail on the ground that she had the propensity to tamper with the evidence and influence the witnesses. Additional Solicitor General Vivek Tankha, who appeared for the CBI, said he was opposing Srilakshmi’s bail application.
The presence of the officer was still necessary for the investigating agency, Tankha stated. The trial court had granted a conditional bail to the officer who was holding the office of Secretary, Mines at the time of the alleged scam in 2007.
She was arrested on the charge of abusing her official position to grant favours to former Karnataka minister Gali Janardhan Reddy and the company owned by him, the Obulapuram Mining Company.