Govt asked to reply to plea in Kesri case

The Delhi high court on Friday asked the central government to reply by July 25 to a petition seeking review of the March 4 court order which expressed satisfaction with the progress of an Central Bureau of Investigation probe into charges that Congress president Sitaram Kesri amassed wealth disproportionate to his known sources of income and gave and took bribes.

A division bench, consisting of Justice Jaspal Singh and Justice Manmohan Sarin, issued the notices on a review petition and a supplementary affidavit filed by Madhuresh, a Patna-based freelance journalist.

The petition, besides seeking the review of the earlier order in which the court had expressed satisfaction over the progress of the investigation in the case, also requested the court that it should monitor the probe as the petitioner feared that the Central Bureau of Investigation had almost closed the case.

The court, while disposing of Madhuresh's previous petition in the case, had noted on March 4, ''We are satisfied that the investigation, though preliminary, has been and is going on well within the defined parameters. In any event, the writ petition has served the legal purpose for which it has been filed." The CBI has been investigating into the matter in a manner which did not call for further monitoring, the court ruled.

However, Madhuresh reiterated his complaint of October 7, 1997 and urged the court to direct the CBI to properly investigate the matter as he has learnt from 'unimpeachable sources' that the CBI has concluded that his charges were 'vague, ambiguous and unsubstantiated'. The petition claimed the CBI had also concluded that Kesri did not have assets disproportionate of his known sources of income.

In his original complaint, Madhuresh had charged Kesri with just that, besides charging that the Congress president had bribed Bihar MLAs during the Rajya Sabha elections and that he had received illegal gratification from various businessmen while he was a central minister.

The review petition alleged that although the court had expected that the CBI would complete its investigations, it appeared that soon after the disposal of the petition, the CBI stopped further inquiries into the matter.

In fact, the CBI director had stated on April 4 that there was no case pending against Kesri and ''there was just an inquiry which we have finished and the report (has been) submitted to the Delhi high court,'' the petition said, adding that this clearly indicated that, even after having told the high court that his agency had not yet completed the investigation, the CBI had, in fact, closed the investigation.

Prashant Bhushan, counsel for the petitioner, told the court that his client had written a letter to the CBI director drawing his attention to the damning statement, published in a newspaper, and asked whether the CBI had closed the investigation into the case.

Bhushan said the CBI is leaving the investigation midway because of the ''delicate'' political equation between the ruling United Front and the Congress party headed by Kesri. He said it was clear that the basis and trust on which the court had disposed of the petitioner's writ petition has been completely belied by subsequent events and facts.

He said that the court had observed in its order that it had no reason to believe that the CBI would not complete the investigation diligently and expeditiously, but subsequent events have belied that view.

The petition also stated that the UF government had also been dilly-dallying on action to be taken against the Congress president in a serious violation of the Foreign Currency Regulation Act which was detected by the income tax department more than a year ago.

It was, therefore, essential that the court reviewed its its judgment and order, and monitors the CBI investigation into the complaint, the petitioner said.