BSY not guilty in bribery case, rules CBI court

All 13, including his sons, off the hook

Former chief minister B S Yeddyurappa was on Wednesday acquitted in a Rs 40 crore bribery case. A special CBI court also acquitted 12 others, including his sons B Y Raghavendra and B Y Vijayendra, son-in-law Sohan Kumar and representatives of JSW Steel, of which Sajjan Jindal is chairman.

“I hold that the prosecution has failed to prove the conspiracy… beyond all reasonable doubt,” said R B Dharmagoudar, 21st Additional City Civil and Sessions and CBI Special Court judge.

The court acquitted all the accused, booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, Prevention of Corruption Act and Karnataka Land (Restriction on Transfer) Act.

Former minister S N Krishnaiah Setty, and Vinod Nowal and Vikash Sharma of JSW Steel were among those arraigned. The agency had registered an FIR against Yeddyurappa and others after the Supreme Court ordered a CBI investigation into the findings of a Lokayukta report.

Earlier, an FIR registered by the Lokayukta police, based on the same charges, was quashed by the Karnataka High Court.

NGO Samaja Parivarthana Samudaya had filed a petition before the Supreme Court seeking a CBI probe.

The prosecution case was that Yeddyurappa as chief minister had abused his position to cause loss to the state exchequer by granting favours to JSW Steel, India’s second largest steel producer.

The CBI had told the court that the government’s delay in raising fines payable to Mysore Minerals Ltd (MML) and the imposition of a ban on the export of iron ore were intended to favour JSW.

As a quid pro quo, Yeddyurappa had demanded and accepted Rs 40 crore, the CBI said. The prosecution also stated that Yeddyurappa had denotified one acre and 12 guntas of land in Rachenahalli. (Denotification refers to the transfer of government-acquired land back to a private party.)

One acre was bought by his sons through Setty, who held a General Power of Attorney. Setty had been a member of Yeddyurappa’s council of ministers.

The same land was later bought by South West Mining Ltd, a subsidiary of JSW, which was accused of paying an inflated price of Rs 20 crore.

Further, the CBI contended that South West donated Rs 20 crore to Prerana Educational and Social Trust, represented by Raghavendra and Vijayendra as trustees.

These acts of Yeddyurappa caused a loss of Rs 871.35 crore to the state, the CBI had argued.

The court held that the consideration received from the sale of land and the donation to the trust could not be termed as illegal gratification.

It accepted the argument of the accused that the market value of the land at Rachenahalli in 2010 was indeed around Rs 20 crore an acre and was not inflated to cover a bribe.

On the donation, the court held that “the prosecution case remained in the realm of probability.'' JSW Steel defended itself saying the donation was part of its corporate social responsibility.

Cong mocks CBI

The Congress trained its guns on the CBI as a Bengaluru court acquitted former Karnataka chief minister B S Yeddyurappa in a corruption case on Wednesday, DHNS reports from New Delhi.

“What can you expect when the prosecutor becomes the defence? The alleged caged parrot of yesteryears has become the top performing poodle of this (Central) government,” AICC spokesman Manish Tewari said when asked to comment on Yeddyurappa’s acquittal.

During the UPA regime, the Supreme Court had described the CBI as a “caged parrot”.

Tewari said he did not expect the CBI to even appeal against the special court verdict in a higher court. “If there is or was or continues to be any open and shut case of corruption and misconduct, it is the case pertaining to Yeddyurappa,” Tewari said.

The Congress spokesman alleged that there was “complete and absolute subversion of the instrumentalities of the Indian state” in the presentation of the Yeddyurappa case before the court.

Indicted by Lokayukta

BJP leader B S Yeddyurappa had to step down as chief minister in 2011 after the Lokayukta held him guilty of receiving kickbacks from JSW.

Chapter 22 of the Lokayukta report indicted him and recommended a detailed investigation into money received by his family. By then, five private complaints were filed against him, accusing him of illegally denotifying land, and he was remanded to judicial custody.

The complaints were later quashed by the Karnataka High Court on the grounds that the sanction order from the governor was defective. The complainant has again approached the Lokayukta special court with the same complaints.