CHENNAI: The Madras High Court, on Monday, refused to stay the investigation initiated by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) of Tamil Nadu police against former minister for municipal administration and senior AIADMK leader SP Velumani into alleged tender irregularities in Chennai and Coimbatore municipal corporations.
The first bench of Chief Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari and Justice N Mala denied the relief as sought by the former minister while questioning the maintainability of the petitions. The bench directed the Tamil Nadu government, the DVAC and the petitioners Arappor Iyakkam and RS Bharathi of DMK to file their counter-affidavit to fresh petitions of Velumani seeking to stay and quash the FIR registered against him in March this year.
It may be noted that, following the petitions filed by Arappor Iyakkam, the HC in October 2019 ordered an inquiry into the allegations of irregularities in the two municipal corporations in awarding tenders. Based on the preliminary enquiry (PE) report filed by DVAC in December 2019, the then AIADMK govt dropped further action on the matter in January 2020. Subsequently, the government filed a petition before the court to dispose of the petition filed by Arappor Iyakkam.
However, after the regime change, two FIRs were filed against Velumani in August 2020 and then in March 2022 under various sections of the IPC and the Prevention of Corruption Act and an investigation was undertaken. Velumani’s plea for a copy of the PE was rejected by the court. He was recently served with the copy by the HC following a direction passed by the Supreme Court on the matter.
Meanwhile, he moved the fresh petitions saying that the allegations were ‘tainted with malicious intention’ vitiated by the ‘abuse of process of law’ and the allegations do not make out any offence. Velumani further contended that the CAG report, as quoted for filing the FIR by the government, did deal with the performance audit and not any of the allegations raised by the complainant. He also stated that the FIR was filed without the permission of the Governor.