Former Telecommunications Minister Dayanidhi Maran, his elder brother Kalanidhi Maran of Sun TV Network and a few other accused in the illegal telephone exchange case have approached the Madras High Court again challenging the charges framed by a special court for the CBI cases in Chennai.
After hearing preliminary arguments advanced by petitioner’s counsel, Justice A.D. Jagadish Chandira directed the High Court Registry to list the cases before Justice N. Anand Venkatesh, whose last order, passed on January 29, was claimed to have been thrown to the winds by the special court at the time of framing of charges on January 30. A battery of senior counsel, including G. Masilamani, AR.L. Sundaresan, A. Ramesh and P. Wilson represented the petitioners. Mr. Sundaresan said the High Court had ordered that charges be framed only after putting necessary questions to the accused and eliciting their answers. However, the order was “blatantly flouted” by the trial court, he alleged.
Mr. Ramesh too said the trial court had conducted the court proceedings on January 30 “in supine indifference to the orders of this court.” He said, there was a blatant error in framing of charges and therefore they should be quashed and the entire trial proceedings before the special court should be stayed until the High Court takes a final decision on the present petitions.
This was the third time the Maran brothers had approached the High Court in connection with the case and the senior counsel explained the reason by stating: “Your Lordship may be wondering why this third round or fourth round of litigation but the reason is that the rule of law has been completely flouted by the trial court,” he said.
