New Delhi: On Friday, the Supreme Court of India ordered the Tamil Nadu government to produce all correspondence regarding the sanction to prosecute former minister V Senthil Balaji in the cash-for-jobs scam with the governor’s office. This directive comes as victims complained that the trial against Balaji is being prejudiced by the pending request for sanction that has been outstanding as of January this year.
Justice AS Oka led the bench and directed the state government to furnish copies of all applications and correspondences about sanction requests. The court also urged the need to be more specific in this matter. It directed the state to file more about the records of the prosecutors appointed to work on Balaji’s cases, including the qualifications of the prosecutors and whether they have been dealing with similar issues in the past.
This decision was in relation to a petition filed by Y Balaji, leading a group of victims seeking to have the Supreme Court provide direction on the appointment of a special public prosecutor for the case. This petition also prayed to the court to set up a special investigation team to look into the causes of the delay and guarantee that the trial would be concluded within one year.
The bench, also comprised of Justice Augustine George Masih, told the state to file an affidavit on such matters, and the further hearing was posted for September 2. The tea party was told in court by senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan and advocate Balaji Srinivasan for the victims of the killing that while the sanction request was sent to the governor on January 4, to date, there has been no positive development in this regard. This has led to several adjournments in the trial court.
In his submission on behalf of the Enforcement Directorate (ED), Solicitor General Tushar Mehta pointed out that Balaji has three predicate offences for which sanction is still pending. He underlined the difficulty of the cases and one of them has more than one hundred witnesses.
Check here for the latest updates in Hindi!