SC rebuffs plea on Karti Chidambaram to travel abroad

The Supreme Court on Wednesday declined an urgent hearing on a plea by Karti Chidambaram, son of senior Congress leader P Chidambaram, who is facing several criminal cases, seeking its permission to go abroad.

"We have better things to do. Let him remain wherever he is," Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi said to the plea by senior advocate K V Vishwanathan on behalf of Karti.

"We are not interested," the bench, also comprising Justices L Nageswara Rao and Sanjay Kishan Kaul, added.

The court's strong rebuff came as the counsel contended that the application filed in November was not coming up for hearing.

On his persistence, the court asked him to file an application stating reasons for early hearing.

"You file an application, we will see what we can do," the bench said.

The CJI had earlier declined the similar plea for an urgent hearing on the application by Karti.

"Karti Chidambaram going abroad is not so important that it will get precedence over other (cases)," the court had said.

The top court had previously accorded urgent hearing to Karti several times on his pleas seeking permission to go abroad.

The top court had allowed Karti Chidambaram to travel to the UK between September 20 and September 30, last despite the Enforcement Directorate's (ED) objection that he has been "blatantly misusing" the liberty granted to him by the court to protract the investigation in the case.

The ED had said the liberty granted to Karti Chidambaram by the apex court was "blatantly and brazenly hampering, subverting, jeopardising and protracting" the probe pending against him in the Aircel Maxis case, which the agency has to complete in six months.

Before that Karti was allowed to visit the UK, France and the US from July 23 to 31.

Karti Chidambaram has been facing several criminal cases including in connection with the grant of Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) clearance in the INX-Media case.