VIJAYAWADA: The Andhra Pradesh High Court on Tuesday extended the deadline set by the Chittoor district sessions court to former minister and founder of Narayana Educational Institutions, P Narayana, to surrender in the case related to the SSC question paper leak case. The court, which had cancelled the bail granted by the magistrate court to Narayana, had earlier asked him to surrender before November 30.
Narayana filed a quash petition in the high court against the sessions' court order. When the petition came up for hearing before the bench of Justice Rao Raghunandan Rao, Additional Advocate General P Sudhakar Reddy said the magistrate had issued interim orders granting bail to Narayana. The Additional AG said Narayana should file a revision petition and not a quash petition. He said the court should grant bail as per law and not by conducting a mini-trial on the basis that a specific section was not applicable to the petitioner.
In the present case of Narayana, the court had conducted such a trial, the AAG informed the bench and said the magistrate court’s observation that a particular section could not be filed against Narayana was not acceptable. There is a need to unravel the conspiracy behind the question paper leak and the granting of bail would hamper the probe, he said.
Arguing on behalf of Narayana, senior counsel Dammalapati Srinivas said the magistrate court granted bail considering the fact that he is not a public servant and Section 409 of the IPC (Criminal breach of trust by a public servant) cannot be registered against him. After hearing both sides, Justice Raghunandan Rao issued orders extending the November 30 deadline till he pronounces his orders in the quash petition.