Delayed sanction for prosecution, a blessing for the accused

Lack of clarity on the time required to grant a sanction to prosecute people charged with offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, has proved to be a blessing for the accused.

While the Supreme Court has issued guidelines in several cases, generally prescribing a period of three months, no clearcut orders exist along these lines, allowing many to evade prosecution for an extended period.

A glaring example of this is the sanction pending for prosecution of BJP legislator of Yelahanka, S R Vishwanath.

On August 3, the Lokayukta police submitted documents supporting the charges that the Yelahanka legislator had assets disproportionate to his income, to the tune of 161 per cent.

The investigation by the Lokayukta police was based on a court-referred private complaint filed by a former police constable, V Shashidhar.

While the total assets belonging to Vishwanath and his family and the ‘benaami’ property were assessed to be Rs 9.11 crore, expenditure was Rs 3.50 crore and his income from salary, business and agricultural sources was Rs 4.87 crore.

The total value of excess assets was said to be Rs 7.74 crore. Most of Vishwanath’s properties were acquired after 2000, according to police.

As Vishwanath is a legislator, the competent authority to accord sanction in his case is the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, K G Bopaiah. Bopaiah’s office received the letter seeking sanction on August 23. As of today, there has been no letter either granting or rejecting the sanction.

While Bopaiah refused to comment on the matter, stating that it was a quasi-judicial matter, the fact remains that the Supreme Court, delivering the judgement in the case of Vineet Narain and Others Vs Union of India in 1997, had stated that a time limit of three months for grant of sanction for prosecution must be strictly adhered to and that an additional time of one month may be allowed where consultation is required with the Attorney General or any other law officer in the Attorney General’s office.

The same was reiterated in the January 2012 judgement in the case of Subramanian Swamy Vs Manmohan Singh.

In fact, the Central Vigilance Commission, empowered to review the progress of applications pending with the competent authorities for sanction, issued a circular in March 2012 stating that the time limits prescribed by the Apex Court must be adhered to in letter and spirit.

Sources in the Lokayukta say that departments usually take anywhere from three to five months to send sanctions letters and at present there are at least 100 cases that are pending sanction in the State. It is usually when sanction is sought for either influential or high profile public servants, that they face an inordinate delay.

Recently, the Department of Personnel and Administrative Reforms (DPAR) rejected sanction for prosecution of former chief engineer of National Highways Bise Gowda after sitting on the sanction letter for two years.

The DPAR also violated the Supreme Court guidelines by giving opportunity to the accused official to explain himself and, held a parallel inquiry and decided that he was not guilty.

In cases of rejection, the Lokayukta has no choice except to write to the competent authority to reconsider the matter.

There are 21 cases at present under Bangalore Urban where sanctions are pending or where letters have been sent, seeking reconsideration of the rejection of sanction.