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A bench of Justice Abhay S Oka and Justice Pankaj Mithal issued a notice to Reddy and the agency on a plea filed by disgruntled YSR Congress MP Raghu Ramakrishna Raju.
”Issue notice. The Registry to place the cases before an appropriate court in the first week of January 2024, after seeking a direction from Hon’ble the Chief Justice of India,” the bench said.
The top court had earlier sought responses from the CBI and Reddy on a plea seeking transfer of the trial of a disproportionate assets case pending before a court in Hyderabad in Telangana to a court in any other state, preferably the Patiala House Court in the national capital. A bench of Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice SVN Bhatti issued notice to the CBI on a transfer petition filed by Raju and asked the probe agency to explain why there was a delay in the completion of the trial in the case. The plea had said, ”The petitioner is a concerned citizen, serving the people as a Member of Parliament in the 17th Lok Sabha. Petitioner’s conscience is shaken by the manner in which State machinery (the Central Bureau of Investigation) is being manipulated to the point of apathy by the state machinery to suit the sitting chief minister of the state of Andhra Pradesh.” He had alleged that after having ”illegally and unjustly” enriched himself and various companies floated by him to the tune of Rs 40,000 crore and necessarily having caused loss to that extent to the public exchequer, the chief minister has ensured that the criminal trial against him remains dormant and no fruitful steps are taken against him. ”Shockingly, the state machinery (represented by the respondent No.1/Central Bureau of Investigation) has been more than happy to be silent spectators to this abuse of the processes of the Courts (turning the criminal trials into ”friendly matches” between accused and prosecution),” he had said. Raju’s plea had said the disproportionate assets case was registered in 2012 and the CBI filed 11 chargesheets in that, resulting in 11 other cases.