Court bins Shivakumar's discharge application

In a setback to Water Resources Minister D K Shivakumar, the special court for people's representatives on Tuesday dismissed a discharge application filed by him.

Shivakumar had petitioned the court to drop his name in connection with a case pertaining to alleged recovery of Rs 8.60 cr in cash during an Income Tax raid on his Delhi residence in 2017.

The court of Justice Ramachandra D Huddar dismissed the petition for which judgement was reserved in the previous hearing. Following the order, officials will now frame charges against Sachin Narayan, Sunil Kumar Sharma, N Rajendra and Anjaneya Hanumantaiah.

Previously, the same court under Justice B V Patil, had admitted the discharge petition filed by Shivakumar.

During the hearing, the judge accepted contention of I-T Department that the complaint filed by it was in compliance with Sec 120(B) - criminal conspiracy - of the Indian Penal Code. I-T officials also argued that Shivakumar had committed a cognizable offence under Sec 276 C (1) and 277 of Income Tax Act,1961. Other offences can only be revealed during the investigation.

Judge Huddar observed that it would be inappropriate to acquit the petitioners at this stage. Truth will come out only after investigation, he said.

The discharge petition by Shivakumar was in connection with the raids carried out on multiple locations against the Congress leader. The raids were conducted in August 2017, when Shivakumar was harbouring 42 Congress MLAs from Gujarat, ahead of Rajya Sabha polls in the state.