HC issues notice to ACB on petitions filed by BSY

The High Court of Karnataka on Tuesday issued notice to the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) on two petitions filed by BJP state president B S Yeddyurappa seeking to quash proceedings against him.

Justice Aravind Kumar refused to grant stay on the ACB proceedings when the matter came up for hearing for the first time. The judge said he would issue notice to ACB first and hear the matter on granting interim relief. Yeddyurappa's counsel C V Nagesh said the complaint against the petitioner is politically motivated. Former Advocate General Ravivarma Kumar is appearing for the ACB.

A complaint was filed with the ACB accusing Yeddyurappa of denotifying land in Bengaluru North and two FIRs were filed against him in the case of 'fake-denotification' of 257 acres of land of which 3.6 acres of land was meant to form Shivaram Karanth Layout in Bengaluru North.

Dr Aiyappa, in his complaint, stated that Yeddyurappa has denotified the land bypassing the de-notified committee's approval when he was the chief minister. Yeddyurappa dropped the vast extent of land from preliminary notification allowing various bulk land owners to get change of land use.

The preliminary notification to form Shivarama Karanth Layout was quashed by the high court in September 2015 as BDA did not implement the plan. Hence the entire acquisition was quashed. Yeddurappa, in his petition contended that when the entire land acquisition was quashed, there is no question of any denotification.