SC pulls up state for challenging quashing of case against Limbavali

The Supreme Court on Monday pulled up the Karnataka government for challenging quashing of a criminal case against BJP MLA and former minister Aravind Limbavali for allegedly facilitating illegal constructions by a real estate firm by revising master plan in Bengaluru South taluk.

“Why have you filed your special leave petition while similar plea by the complainant was already dismissed by us...You have got a grievance against the former minister but why did you not consider that the matter was earlier dismissed,” a bench of Justices Ranjan Gogoi and Navin Sinha told advocate V N Raghupathy, appearing for the state government.

Before dismissing the state’s plea, the court noted that the petition by the state government was filed when the matter pertaining to complainant N Nagaraju was disposed of earlier this year.

The state government has challenged the order passed by the High Court of Karnataka on October 25,2016. The high court had quashed the FIR registered by the Lokayukta police in 2012 against Limbavali, the then Minister for Health and Family Welfare, and several officers from the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike and department of Agriculture, among others.

It was alleged that Limbavali and officials had shown undue favours to DLF by permitting violation of the Revised Master Plan to facilitate illegal constructions in Bengaluru South taluk. They were alleged to have engineered a scheme of illegally widening the road in order to enable the property developers to claim and utilize a higher floor area ratio in respect of the constructions raised by them.

The high court, however, had found the allegations as vague and untenable and quashed the investigations.