HC to hear plea seeking CBI probe against Vasundhara, son on land sale

The Delhi High Court on Tuesday, posted for October 19, hearing a plea seeking CBI probe against Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and her son Dushyant Singh for allegedly selling a piece of government land to NHAI for widening of NH3 in 2010.

Justice P.S. Teji posted for October 19 the hearing on the petition, filed by a Rajasthan-based lawyer Srijana Shrestha, alleging that Raje and her son had illegally claimed ownership of 567 sq metres of land surrounding the Dholpur Palace in Dholpur town and sold it to the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) for around Rs.2 crore.

The plea was filed in the high court after a lower court in April had refused to entertain his complaint on the ground that there was no sanction order to proceed against them.

Challenging the order of the special CBI judge, the petition alleged that the court erred in dismissing the plea as there was no need of sanction for taking cognizance of a complaint and the court should have directed a probe to find out the truth.

Justice Teji asked the Delhi government counsel to produce before him the notification by which the CBI court was set up.

The petition said: "Section 19 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, falls under Chapter 5 which deals with sanction for prosecution. Section 19 creates a bar for the court to take cognizance of an offence committed by a public servant. In other words, the bar is not on the cognizance of a complaint but the bar is on the cognizance of offence committed by a public servant."

The petitioner alleged that the accused had fraudulently filed a memo before the government authority claiming that they had the title to the land and the authority admitted their claim and paid around Rs.2 crore to Dushyant Singh.

"It is submitted that the land surrounding the Dholpur Palace was Siwai Chakk falling under Survey No. 875. However, the accused persons had conspired and by unlawful and wrong means by misusing official position had taken pecuniary advantage by placing false/wrong facts in collusion with government officials and thereby receiving cheque for an amount of Rs. 1,97,21,720," the petition said.