New Delhi: In a setback to Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, the Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the Nagpur trial court to consider afresh a complaint alleging that in his election affidavit in the 2014 state election, he withheld info-rmation on two criminal cases. Mumbai la-wyer Satish Ukey had filed the complaint. He later moved the SC on the matter.
A complaint alleging concealment of the two cases by Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis in his affidavit, a bench of Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, Justice Deepak Gupta and Justice Aniruddha Bose set aside the Bombay High Court order upholding the dismissal of the complaint by the Nagpur Magistrate.
Noting that Fadnavis had “knowledge” of the cases against him not mentioned in the affidavit, CJI Gogoi said, “We unhesitatingly arrive at the conclusion that the order of the learned trial Court upheld by the High Court dated May 3, 2018 is legally not tenable and the same deserves to be set aside.”
CJI Gogoi said that Ukey’s complaint would be considered afresh by the trial Court from the stage where it was interdicted by May 30, 2016, order.
Fadnavis had contended that if “of the 25 cases, I disclose 23, forgetting two. Does forgetting two cases would bring me in the pale of Section 125 A of the Representation of Peoples Act?” The section provides for penalty for filing a false affidavit.
