New Delhi:The Supreme Court on Friday said it will lay down the law on the issue of high courts revoking orders dictated in open courts.
A bench comprising justices Abhay S Oka and Augustine George Masih made this observation after it came across a case in which the Madras High Court quashed a money laundering case against a former IPS officer and later modified its direction, and reheard the matter.
The apex court put on hold the proceedings in a money laundering case against former IPS officer M S Jaffer Sait. The case was registered in connection with an alleged illegal allotment of a Tamil Nadu Housing Board plot. The apex court has scheduled the matter for further hearing on November 22.
Sai moved the apex court saying that his case was reheard within days after allowing his plea for quashing of the proceedings in the matter. Earlier, the apex court had sought a report from the high court’s registrar general on the issue.
The apex court, on September 30, had called the decision of the high court to re-hear the matter as 'absolutely wrong'. The apex court made this observation after inspecting the high court’s report.
On August 21, a division bench of the high court quashed the proceedings against Sait on the grounds that the corruption case registered by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC), which is the predicate offence for the ED case, has already been quashed by the high court. Later, the order was revoked and the matter was reheard and judgment was reserved.
According to Sait, in 2011 a complaint was made alleging that he had gotten illegal allotment of Tamil Nadu Housing Board plots at Thiruvanmiyur in Chennai. The DVAC registered an FIR under the Prevention of Corruption Act, which was quashed by the high court in May 2019. The ED, in June 2020, registered an ECIR (Enforcement Case Information Report) based on the case registered by the DVAC. However, the high court quashed the ED case on the basis of previous quashing of the predicate corruption case by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption.
