SC declines to review verdict quashing FIR against Mayawati

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In a breather for former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mayawati, the Supreme Court Thursday disposed off a petition seeking a review of its judgement quashing the CBI's October 2003 FIR into the alleged disproportionate assets of the BSP supremo.

A bench of Chief Justice P. Sathasivam and Justice Dipak Misra said that the review of its July 6, 2012 order could be raised only if there is an error apparent on the face of the records.

Referring to earlier judgments of the apex court on review jurisdiction, Chief Justice Sathasivam said: "Review of the earlier order cannot be done unless the court is satisfied that a material error, manifest on the face of the order, undermines its soundness or results in miscarriage of justice."

"In review jurisdiction, mere disagreement with the view of the judgment cannot be the ground for invoking the same.

"As long as the point is already dealt with and answered, the parties are not entitled to challenge the impugned judgment in the guise that an alternative view is possible under the review jurisdiction," the court said.

Terming the review petition by Kamlesh Verma as not satisfying the parameters under which such a petition could be moved, the court said: "In such circumstances and in the light of enormous decisions, we find that there is no material within the parameters of review jurisdiction to go into the earlier order" of July 6.

Dealing with its substantive order which was sought to reviewed, the court reiterated that by its July 6 judgement, it had only said that the investigation into Mayawati's alleged disproportionate assets by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) could not arise from its order of probe into Taj corridor case passed on Sep 18, 2003.

"...we have not said or expressed anything beyond the subject matter of the dispute", the court said

In pursuance to the apex court's Sep 18, 2003 and two earlier orders, direction to inquiry into the allegation regularities in the execution of Taj Heritage Corridor Project under Taj Trapezium Zone (TTZ) Area, CBI registered an FIR Oct 5, 2003.

On the same day it registered another FIR against Mayawati at Lucknow on the basis of its inquiry into the alleged acquisition of disproportionate movable and immovable assets of by Mayawati and her close relatives.

The CBI said that it had carried out its inquiry into alleged disproportionate assets of the BSP leader in pursuance to Sept 18, 2003 and two earlier orders of the apex court.

On a petition by Mayawati, the apex court July 6, 2012 quashed the FIR that was registered in Lucknow, saying it had not issued "any direction to the CBI to conduct a roving inquiry against the assets of the petitioner (Mayawati) commencing from 1995 to 2003..." and the agency had "exceeded its jurisdiction in lodging" the FIR in the "absence of any direction from this Court in its Sep 18, 2003 order or any subsequent orders".