SC grants interim relief to Yediyurappa in land scam case

The Supreme Court on Monday (April 5) stayed an order of the Karnataka High Court, providing interim relief to Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa in a 10-year-old land scam case against him.

A bench headed by Chief Justice of India SA Bobde gave the order on a plea filed by Yediyurappa against an earlier order of the high court.

The Karnataka chief minister has been accused of illegally de-notifying 20 acres of government land to private parties during his tenure between 2008 and 2012.

The complaint against him said the land scam allegedly caused a loss to the public exchequer as service fee of ₹2.64 crore and development fee of ₹6 crore were fortified in the process.

The case was filed under sections 7,10 and 13 of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

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While in 2016, a Special Judge had scrapped the case, stating that there were no allegations against Yediyurappa in the complaint, the order was reversed by the Karnataka High Court which said the magistrate or the court has to take cognizance of the offence alleged in the charge sheet once it has been filed.

Yediyurappa had moved the Supreme Court against the high court order.

According to Live Law, the chief minister’s counsel said that Yediyurappa was not named in the PCR or the FIR filed against him, the investigation was conducted only against the first nine accused, there were no allegations against Yediyurappa and that the petitioner had no “locus-standi” to challenge the order of the Special Court when investigating agencies haven’t taken any such step.