Karnataka HC allows plea by Dy CM to withdraw plea against sanction in disproportionate assets case

The Karnataka High court on Wednesday allowed a plea by Karnataka's Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar to withdraw his plea challenging the sanction accorded to the CBI to investigate disproportionate assets case.

The development comes within days of the Congress led government's decision to revoke the sanction granted to the CBI in the case.

Senior advocate A M Singhvi and Uday Holla, appearing for Shivakumar, filed a memo along with the copy of the state government's order withdrawing the sanction accorded to the CBI by the then BJP government.

The counsel appearing for the CBI as well as BJP MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal, who has filed an intervening application, opposed the memo stating that it was illegal for the state government to withdraw consent since the FIR had been registered and substantial investigation completed in the case.

However, a division bench of Chief Justice Prasanna B Varale and Justice Krishna S Dixit permitted withdrawal of petition/appeal, observing that there is no appeal challenging the withdrawal of consent.

On November 11, the Supreme Court had declined to interfere with the Karnataka High Court's interim stay on the state government's consent to the CBI to probe the case against senior Congress leader Shivakumar.

The court had then said the CBI's application for vacation of the stay has already been filed before the High Court, which should decide it preferably within two weeks.

The central agency claimed has Shivakumar amassed Rs 74.93 crore of wealth, disproportionate to known sources of income, from April 1, 2013 to April 30, 2018, when he was the energy minister in the Congress-led Karnataka government.

The CBI filed the FIR against him in October 2020 on charges of corruption, based on the findings of the income-tax departments searches carried out in August 2017 at around 70 premises linked to him.