The Supreme Court on Tuesday referred to a larger bench a petition lodged by former Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu for quashing of a FIR in the skill development scam case. Chandrababu Naidu was arrested on September 9 by the Andhra Pradesh crime investigation department in connection to the skill development scam case.
The former Andhra Pradesh chief minister was granted interim medical bail by the Andhra Pradesh High Court in October last year. He was also granted regular bail by a single-judge bench later. Today, the verdict was pronounced by the Supreme Court bench of Justice Aniruddha Bose and Justice Bela M Trivedi.
The bench heard Chandrababu Naidu’s special leave petition challenging a September 22 order passed by the Andhra Pradesh High Court and declined to quash a FIR arraigning the former chief minister and TDP supremo as one of the accused in the skill development scam.
The Supreme Court reportedly passed two separate judgements. Justice Aniruddha Bose observed that previous sanction within the meaning of Section 17A of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 will have to be obtained after becoming operational, failing which an inquiry would be illegal.
Subsequently, Justice Bose held that Chandrababu Naidu could not have been proceeded against for offences under Section 13(1)(c), 13(1)(d) and 13(2) of the 1988 act on grounds of non-procurement of prior approval from the concerned authority. He further clarified that the State could now apply and obtain the approval order. He also ruled that the trial court had the jurisdiction to pass the remand order and refused to quash it. He noted that a lack of approval would not make the entire remand order non-est.
Meanwhile, Justice Trivedi disagreed with Justice Bose on interpretation of Section 17A and underlined that this provision could not be made applicable retrospectively. She noted that Section 17A, being substantive in nature, would only apply to new offences under the PC Act, which had significant amendments in 2018.
Justice Trivedi remarked that the prior sanction requirement under Section 17A would apply only to the new offences and not to the offences existing prior to the 2018 amendment. Additionally, she pointed out the legislative intent behind the provision and said that it cannot be the objective of Section 17A to give any benefit to dishonest public servants. She added that if the section is applied retrospectively, it will frustrate many pending enquiries and investigations.
Due to the split in the bench’s interpretation of Section 17A of the Prevention of Corruption Act, the matter will now be referred to a larger bench. After both the judges pronounced the operative portion of their judgement, Justice Aniruddha Bose said that as they have taken different opinions on the interpretation of the section, as also applicability on the appellant, they refer the matter to the Chief Justice of India for appropriate directions.