HYDERABAD: The single-judge bench of Justice Bollam Vijaysen Reddy of Telangana High Court on Monday ordered the transfer the investigation into the poachgate case from the state government’s Special Investigation Team (SIT) to the CBI.
The court quashed the government order 63, constituting the SIT headed by Hyderabad police commissioner C.V. Anand and other police officials, to probe the poachgate case registered at Moinabad police station, following a raid at the farmhouse of BRS legislator P. Rohit Reddy on October 26.
The court also quashed the investigation conducted so far by the investigation officer of Moinabad police station and SIT.
Justice Reddy gave these directions while allowing the petitions filed by the accused — Ramachandra Bharati, K. Nanda Kumar and D.P.S.K.P.N. Simhayaji.
However, the court dismissed the petition filed by Telangana BJP general secretary Gujjala Premendar Reddy. It contended that the petition was not maintainable as BJP was a political party and it was in no way related to the issue.
The state government said that it was ready to file an appeal before a division bench immediately after the copy of the single judge’s order is released.
Advocate-general B.S. Prasad urged the judge to make the copy available as early as possible to which the court agreed.
The prominent consideration of the court was how the investigation details, which were the main evidence, were shared with Chief Minister K. Chandrashekar Rao, who had convened a press conference where he released videos and some phone conversations about the episode and forwarded it to various constitutional bodies.
The court apprehended that a biased, tainted and unfair investigation was being made out by the SIT. It opined that in view of the press conference and availability of crucial documents in public domain, the actual bias need not be proved by the accused petitioner, to defend their case. The issue has to be seen from the point of view of the accused, whether any prejudice is caused to them or not, the judge said.
The court said that the accused had a guaranteed right under Article 21 for fair investigation and trial. They could approach the court to transfer the investigation if there were legitimate apprehensions over the investigation agency, the court observed.
“In this case, the SIT informed the court that it had not released any material to the Chief Minister and the state is silent in their counters as to who shared investigation material with the Chief Minister. It is a burning question as to who shared trap proceedings (video recordings) to the Chief Minister and to the media,” the court said.
Further, the court stated that there is no doubt the alleged incident of poaching or luring of MLAs from one political party to another was a serious crime, but, the investigation details at the preliminary stage were released to the media. Public flaunting of incidents and events has caused prejudice to the accused. The investigation material should not have been shared with other authorities and media, the court observed.
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