Gujarat high court on Friday did not entertain a petition seeking action against senior BJP leader Arun Jaitley for accusing the CBI of being used as a tool by the Congress.
The petition was filed by Mukul Sinha, the lawyer of Gopinathan Pillai whose son Pranesh alias Javed Sheikh was killed along with college student Ishrat Jahan and two others by the Gujarat police in June 2004.
Sinha alleged that Jaitley, by writing an article on his website, had tried to obstruct the ongoing probe into the Ishrat Jahan fake encounter case by the CBI. The latter has allegedly tried to interfere with the due process of law as the high court itself had handed over the probe to the investigating agency. Jaitley’s article creates an impression that the CBI was probing the case at Congress’s instance and not that of the court.
However, the bench, consisting of justices Jayant Patel and Z K Saiyed, said the article does not prima facie merit action under the contempt of court act. “The article has nothing to do with the matter pending before the court. Merely expressing an opinion does not amount to interference with an ongoing investigation,” said the judges.
Sinha, however, argued that action should be initiated against Jaitley as he had tried to demolish the faith and credibility of the CBI, which was probing the case on the orders of the high court.
The bench then asked Sinha to place the matter with the regular bench of justices Jayant Patel and Abhilasha Kumari which had ordered the CBI probe and was also monitoring it.
Sinha agreed and later withdrew his plea to place it before the regular bench. Jaitley, in his website, had written that the CBI was carrying out a political vendetta of Congress against Gujarat government.
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