The Supreme Court on Thursday issued notice to a journalist and others on a petition filed by the Uttarakhand government to set aside a Nainital High Court order which quashed an FIR registered against them for cheating, forgery and conspiracy and went on to suo motu order a CBI probe into allegations against Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat.
This development comes a few days after the Supreme Court, October 29, stayed the part of the High Court order which directed a CBI probe into allegations against the Chief Minister.
Now, the State government wants the entire High Court order of October 27 to be set aside, including the quashing of an FIR registered against journalist Umesh Kumar Sharma and some others.
A Bench led by Justice Ashok Bhushan issued notice to Mr. Sharma and other respondents on the State’s appeal, represented by battery of lawyers led by senior advocates Mukul Rohatgi, P.S. Patwalia, A.N.S Nadkarni and advocate Vanshaja Shukla. The respondents may file their counter-affidavits. The case would come up after four weeks.
The case pertains to a Facebook video broadcast by Mr. Sharma allegedly showing documents and back account details of one Dr. Harender Singh Rawat and his wife. He allegedly claimed that the couple were related to the Chief Minister. The video claimed that deposits of money meant for the Chief Minister were made into these bank accounts when demonetisation was announced in 2016. Mr. Rawat was then the BJP State-in-charge of Jharkhand at the time.
The government plea said police inquiry found that no such deposits were made into the bank accounts of Dr. Harender Singh Rawat and his wife during or after the 2016 demonetisation period.
