BENGALURU: The counsel for BS Yeddyurappa argued before the Karnataka High Court on Friday that the preliminary investigation of the Anti Corruption Bureau into the alleged denotification by the former chief minister is like ‘a blind man in the dark room searching for a black cat which is not there’.
Senior counsel C V Nagesh made this submission before Justice Aravind Kumar who is hearing two petitions filed by Yeddyurappa challenging the two First Information Reports (FIRs) registered by the Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) against him on the charges of denotification of land. The FIRs were based on a complaint filed by Dr Ayyappa, former vice-chancellor of a private university.
Further, he argued that the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) did not consider the recommendations of Yeddyurappa for denotification of land at all. Therefore, it was neither loss nor gain. Accordingly, there were no essential ingredients in the preliminary investigation conducted by the ACB to show that Yeddyurappa demanded and obtained illegal gratification. The ACB did not find basic materials to constitute offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act against Yeddyurappa and was only saying that some note sheets were missing from files and some holes were found in the documents.
Meanwhile, the counsel submitted a memo in the court, containing the samples of denotification done by BDA in favour of sitting MLA Byrathi Basavaraj at the instructions of present Congress government.
According to these documents, the BDA issued endorsement in favour of Byrathi Basavaraju not to include 18 acres land in the acquisition, following the communication issued by the State Government on February 13, 2014. However, Prof Ravivarma Kumar, senior counsel representing ACB, raised objections to it. Then the judge asked him to file objections if any, after taking the memo on record.
The professor also submitted that the submission of the counsel of Yeddyurappa that this government had done denotification of 1,300 acres land acquired for Dr Shivaram Karanth Layout is false.That submission is abuse of process of law, he claimed. In reply, Nagesh asked the counsel whether the ACB was claiming that his submission was false?Further hearing was adjourned to Monday.