The Madras High Court has set aside the discharge order of Tamil Nadu Rural Development Minister I Periyasamy in a corruption case. The judgement came in suo motu revision proceedings initiated by the court last year.
The verdict, which had been reserved on February 13, was tabled by the bench of Justice N Anand Venkatesh on Monday. In the order, the judge stated, “The legitimacy of the administration of criminal justice will be eroded and public confidence will be shaken if MLAs and Ministers facing corruption cases can short-circuit criminal trials by adopting the modus operandi that has been carried out in this case.”
The judge pointed out that the Special Court discharged Periyasamy on March 17, 2023, from the case on the ostensible ground of a supposed defect/invalidity in sanction under Section 19 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.
“The impugned order…suffers from manifest perversity and gross illegality. It is also tainted by procedural impropriety as the Special Court had acted in open defiance of the order dated 11.11.2022 passed by this Court…dismissing the first round of discharge petitions and directing the Special Court to proceed with trial,” Justice Venkatesh stressed.
Taking a serious view, he held, “This Court has no hesitation in concluding that this case warrants the exercise of powers under Section 397/401 CrPC to prevent the subversion of the criminal justice system through a palpably illegal order of discharge”.
The allegation against Periyasamy is that during his tenure as the Minister for Housing in the DMK cabinet from 2008 to 2009, he colluded with others to unlawfully acquire a High Income Group Plot through the Tamil Nadu Housing Board in the Mogappair Eri Scheme.
The judge wrote, “The public should not be led to believe that a trial against a politician in this State is nothing but a mockery of dispensing criminal justice. AConstitutional Court is duty-bound, under the Constitution, to ensure that such things do not come to pass”.
The inquiry against Periyasamy was initiated in 2011 when the DMK was voted out of power. The Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) in its report in 2012 stated that there was something seriously amiss about how the allotment was made in haste. Thereafter, the Tamil Nadu Vigilance Commission accorded permission to register a regular case against Periyasamy in February 2012.
An FIR was registered by the DVAC for the offences under Sections 120-B, 420 and 109 of the IPC and 13(1)(d) read with Section 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, against Periyasamy and two others, and the proceedings began before the Special Court for Cases Under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
In 2016, on Periyasamy’s plea, the high court called for the records from the Special Court, and the entire proceedings before the Special Court stood neutralised.
Later in July 2019, the matter was transferred to the Special Court for MP/MLA cases. The court framed charges against the accused persons in December 2019. Thereafter, nothing significant happened in the matter till May 2020 and by that time the DMK was voted back to power.
In May 2022, the earlier judge who had unsuccessfully persevered to conduct a trial was moved out and another successor was directed to assume charge.
In February 2023, a petition under “Section 19 of the PC Act”, was filed at the behest of Periyasamy with a prayer to discharge him from the case. In March 2023, he was discharged from the case.
The high court took note of these developments in the matter and noted in its order, “on closer scrutiny, it is self-evident that this was part of a well-orchestrated plot to somehow short-circuit the proceedings before the Special Court”.
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