Adarsh case: HC bench recuses itself from hearing plea

April 24, 2015 03:10 pm | Updated 07:55 pm IST - Mumbai

A view of the controversial Adarsh Building in Mumbai. File photo: Vivek Bendre

A view of the controversial Adarsh Building in Mumbai. File photo: Vivek Bendre

The Bombay High Court on Friday recused itself from hearing a petition in the Adarsh Housing Society scam case.

When the matter came up for hearing before the division bench of Justices P V Hardas and Shalini Phansalkar-Joshi, Justice Hardas said, “Not before the bench in which my colleague Shalini Phansalkar-Joshi is a part.”

Petitioner Pravin Wategaonkar told The Hindu that an alternate bench will hear his and all other petitions related to the Adarsh case.

This is the second recusal in the matter. Last June, a division bench of Justices VM Kanade and PD Kode had recused itself from hearing the matter.

Mr. Wategaonkar had in July 2013 filed a petition seeking to make former Maharashtra Chief Minister Sushilkumar Shinde as an accused. The CBI filed a reply giving a clean chit to Shinde on the ground that the evidence against Mr. Shinde was “deficient and insufficient.” In their 2013 affidavit filed before the High Court, the CBI had stated there is no evidence to suggest that Mr. Shinde had abused his position as a public servant.

The petitioner then sought the court’s directions to the CBI to produce all the evidence the agency had gathered during the course of its investigation. He pointed out that as per the report of the Adarsh judicial Commission, Mr. Shinde, in his capacity as chief minister, failed to heed a suggestion from the finance department against allotment of land to the Adarsh housing society.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.