Kochi: In a setback to the state government and clearing his way for the appointment as member of the Kerala Administrative Tribunal, the Kerala High Court on Friday struck down a vigilance court order to conduct an inquiry against former state police chief T.P. Senkumar on allegations of corruption in sanctioning two loans to a private company while he was the managing director of Kerala Transport Development Finance Corporation (KTDFC) in 2010 and in submitting false records to claim leave benefits. The vigilance court had ordered the case filed by CPM leader A.J. Sukarno.
The court pointed that the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (VACB), which had suo motu registered a case and conducted an investigation into the allegation that Mr Senkumar had sanctioned two loans of Rs 10 crore each to a firm in a span of six months to circumvent the rule that the managing director can sanction a loan up to Rs10 crore, had found no wrongdoing on the part of Mr Senkumar. Holding that petitioning the vigilance court for an investigation on the same allegation was a ploy to stop Mr Senkumar’s appointment as a member of the KAT, a single bench of the High Court rejected the arguments of the government and Mr Sukarno that Mr Senkumar rushed to the court before the court took cognisance of it or a first information report was filed.
Mr Senkumar moved court only after the investigating officer failed to submit a report on the day fixed by the vigilance court, the judge said. Pointing out that the Supreme Court has held that in certain circumstances a complaint may be quashed at the threshold, the court said it can exercise extraordinary power under Article 228 of the Constitution and CrPC Section 482 “to prevent the abuse of the process of court or otherwise to secure the ends of justice where a criminal proceeding is manifestly attended by mala fides and or where the proceedings are maliciously instituted with an ulterior motive for wreaking vengeance on the accused and with a view to spite him due to private and personal grudge.” Listing the sequence that forced the state government to send the recommendation of a committee, headed by the Chief Justice of the High Court that named Mr Senkumar as a member of KAT, the court said the pendency of the complaint in the vigilance court “is a stumbling block for the petitioner to be appointed as a member.”
