The former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu and the former Minister for Municipal Administration in the TDP government P. Narayana on Friday got relief from Andhra Pradesh High Court in the criminal proceedings initiated by Crime Investigation Department (CID) for their alleged involvement in the assigned lands scandal in Amaravati, as Justice C. Manavendranath Roy of the High Court stayed the investigation for four weeks.
After hearing the arguments on behalf of the government by Additional Advocate-General Jasti Nagabhushan, and senior advocates Siddhartha Luthra and Dammalapati Srinivas for the petitioners, Justice Roy said he needed to explore the contours of the immunity available to Mr. Naidu and Mr. Narayana under the A.P. Capital Region Development Authority (CRDA) Act, 2014, while taking due cognisance of the fact that they were Chairman and Vice-Chairman of the CRDA which was entrusted with the overall task of development of the capital city in the Vijayawada-Guntur region.
The advocates who appeared for Mr. Naidu and Mr. Narayana argued that all official actions in pursuance of the CRDA Act enjoyed an immunity under Section 146 of the said Act. They insisted that G.O No. 41 through which the Land Pooling Scheme (Formulation and Implementation) Rules, 2015 were notified, had been placed for post-facto approval of the former Chief Minister and that he had no role in their coming into force.
Mr. Nagabhushan said as a person at the helm of affairs, Mr. Naidu could not disown his role in the issuance of the impugned G.O No. 41 (dated February 17, 2016).
He contended that the G.O was surreptitiously brought into force and assigned lands which would be normally resumed from encroachers in terms of the A.P. Assigned Lands (Prohibition of Transfers) Act of 1977, were taken under the pooling scheme in clear violation of norms. This resulted in benefits to the encroachers and caused a huge loss to the State exchequer, he observed.
