The Madras High Court on Tuesday invoked the doctrine of forum conveniens and held that it would be appropriate if former Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram’s son Karti Chidambaram approached the Delhi High Court for quashing a First Information Report registered against him by the Central Bureau of Investigation as well as the summons issued by the agency to him in connection with the INX Media case.
Justice P. Velmurugan held so while pronouncing his verdict on the question of maintainability raised by the CBI. The judge ruled that the Madras High Court had the jurisdiction to entertain the petitions filed by Mr. Karti. Nevertheless, in order to avoid conflicting judgments if some other person related to the case approached the Delhi High Court, he said it would be appropriate for the same court to deal with all connected cases.
The judge directed the High Court Registry to return all the papers filed by Mr. Karti so that he could approach the Delhi High Court which had superintending powers over the Special Court for hearing CBI cases in Delhi. The agency filed the FIR on May 15 and issued summons to him in July to probe the alleged misuse of foreign investments by the media firm in 2007.
The firm, then owned by Peter and Indrani Mukerjea, had been accused of having received Foreign Direct Investment of ₹305 crore from two Mauritius-based companies by sale of shares at a premium of ₹800 per share after getting permission from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board to receive just ₹ 4.62 crore. Mr. Karti allegely received commissions from the firm for scuttling a probe into the issue by the Department of Revenue under the Finance Ministry.
Journalists evicted
Curiously, Mr. Justice Velmurugan pronounced the orders after sending the journalists out of his court hall. Though some journalists wanted to know how they could be prevented from reporting open court proceedings, the staff expressed their helplessness.
