DA case: HC refuses to postpone Bhavani Singh’s arguments

The Karnataka High Court on Wednesday declined to postpone arguments of the Special Public Prosecutor (SPP) in the appeals filed by AIADMK general secretary Jayalalithaa and others against their conviction in the disproportionate assets case.

DMK leader K. Anbazhagan had filed a memo before Justice C. R. Kumaraswamy, who is hearing the appeals, seeking postponement of arguments of G. Bhavani Singh, SPP, till the Supreme Court heard Mr. Anbazhagan’s special leave petitions (SLPs) for appointing a new SPP, and also to allow him to be an intervener in the appeals.

‘Inappropriate’

In the memo, Mr. Anbazhagan had stated that it would not be appropriate for Mr. Singh to continue arguments in the appeals since the issue of continuation of Mr. Singh as the SPP was pending before the apex court, which would be hearing the issue on March 9. However, Justice Kumaraswamy continued hearing arguments of the SPP while adjourning hearing on Mr. Anbazhagan’s memo to next week as Mr. Singh as well as the counsel for Ms. Jayalalithaa and other convicted persons wanted to file objections to the memo.

‘Calculation wrong’

Mr. Singh told the High Court that the investigating agency had not properly computed the expenses made by Ms. Jayalalithaa towards marriage of her former foster son, V.N. Sudhakaran. The charge sheet had said that she had spent Rs. 6.45 crore towards the marriage.

Even the Special Court’s calculation did not appear to be correct, said Mr. Singh stating that it required to be recomputed. The Special Court had considered that Rs. 3 crore was spent for the marriage.

However, Mr. Singh said that despite discrepancies in the calculation of marriage and other expenses, the value of Ms. Jayalalithaa’s assets would remain several crores disproportionate to her known sources of income.

Meanwhile, Mr. Singh read out depositions of three witnesses — P.S Ramaraj and Siva, both real estate businessmen, and S. Radhakrishnan, a Tamil Nadu government servant.

Despite discrepancies in calculation, Jayalalithaa’s assets remain beyond known sources of income, says SPP