Poachgate: Counsels for accused want State appeal dismissed

Hyderabad: Dushyant Dave, senior counsel of Supreme Court, appearing for Telangana in the BRS MLAs Poachgate case, on Monday argued before the High Court division bench comprising Chief Justice Ujjal Bhuyan and Justice N Tukaramji, virtually.

Dave vehemently opposed the arguments of DVV Seetharama Murthy, senior counsel, and L Ravichander, senior counsel, who appeared for the main three accused Ramachandra Bharati, Nandu Kumar and Simhayaji, whose contention before the division bench on January 6 was that Justice BollamVijaysen Reddy had passed orders on the batch of writ petitions filed by accused and others seeking a CBI probe is on criminal jurisdiction side. Hence, an appeal against the order of the single judge lies only in the Supreme Court, not before the High Court.

They contended before the court that the writ appeals filed by the State, being heard by the division bench are not maintainable and have to be dismissed.

Dave said "clearly this has not been a case where the single judge has exercised power under criminal jurisdiction side because the three accused and others, have approached the single judge not with a plea to quash FIR 455/2022 filed at Moinabad Police station, having received a beneficial order in the form of Mandamus, the petitioners (three main accused and others) before the single judge cannot say that this is an order delivered on criminal jurisdiction side.. this is very unjust", averred Dave.

S D Sanjay, another senior counsel appearing for one of the accused, argued before the division bench that the single judge is right in transferring the case to the CBI because the SIT constituted to probe the case comprises three IPS officers, whose service conditions are under the control of the State Chief Minister.

"When their service rules are under the control of the CM, how can the petitioners believe that the investigation will not be a tainted one", argued Sanjay.

The hearing was adjourned to January 10.