SC adjourns plea against withdrawal of CBI consent for probe against K’taka deputy CM Shivakumar

The Supreme Court on Monday adjourned by four weeks the hearing on a plea against the withdrawal of consent to the CBI for probing a DA case against Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar.

A bench of Justices Surya Kant and Ujjal Bhuyan deferred the matter after Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had also filed an appeal against the Karnataka High Court order.

The top court was hearing a plea filed by BJP MLA Basangouda R Patil (Yatnal) who had challenged the August 29 Karnataka HC order rejecting his plea against the withdrawal of consent.

During the hearing, Mehta informed the bench that the CBI appeal had not been listed as yet whereas senior advocate Ranjit Kumar, representing Shivakumar, sought time to file a reply in the matter.

The apex court had on September 17 issued a notice to Shivakumar and the state government on the MLA’s plea.

A CBI plea challenging the Karnataka Congress government’s decision to withdraw the consent to the agency to probe the disproportionate assets (DA) case against Shivakumar was held to be “non-maintainable” by the high court on August 29.

The court dismissed the plea challenging the November 23, 2023 order of the state government referring the alleged Rs 74.93 crore DA case to the Lokayukta for investigation. The CBI had alleged Shivakumar amassed assets disproportionate to his known sources of income between 2013 and 2018 being a minister in the erstwhile Congress government at the time.

Later, when the BJP came to power in the state, its government granted sanction to the CBI to prosecute Shivakumar.

The current Karnataka government headed by Siddaramaiah had on November 23, 2023, held the previous BJP government’s move to give consent to the CBI to investigate the DA case against Shivakumar to be illegal and decided to withdraw it.