The Gauhati High Court recently issued notice on a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in connection with a project under the Deen Dayal Upadhaya Gram Jyoti Yojna (DDUGJY) for three districts of Arunachal Pradesh, namely West Kameng, Tawang and Namsai.
The PIL has been filed by one Kaku Potom.
It is the case of the petitioner that the work in question was allotted without following the due process of law wherein recourse to forgery and other illegal means were also taken to. It is also alleged that the entire concept of a fair competition was minimized and the work was allotted to a favourable party.
The counsel for the petitioner accordingly prayed for a direction for registering a criminal case on the subject and for monitoring the same. The alternate prayer is for directing a judicial inquiry.
On the other hand, L. Perme, Standing Counsel, Power Department, submitted that the instant petition in the guise of PIL is only personal vendetta which has been initiated on the instance of the Minister of Commerce.
The Standing Counsel has drawn the attention of the High Court to a DO letter dated 20.09.2021 issued by the said incumbent to the Regional Head of ICICI Bank, Tezpur. The Standing Counsel has also referred to the interim prayer from which it appears that there is oblique intention on the part of the petitioner as the prayer is in connection with reverting the Executive Engineer (E) , Bomdila Electrical Division West Kameng , Arunachal Pradesh to make the original posting as an Assistant Engineer.
It is further submitted that the present petition is an abuse of the process and there is an embargo under the amended provision of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Lastly, it is submitted that the project in question has been completed and has also been commissioned: The aforesaid propositions were however denied by the petitioner.
While considering the PIL, the Division Bench of Justice S.K. Medhi and Justice Kakheto Sema issued notice to the respondents and posted the matter on 25.07.2022 for further hearing.