In a PIL alleging unaccountable assets owned by Mumbai Congress chief Kripashankar Singh, the petitioner today complained to Bombay high court that reports of probe conducted by the income tax, Enforcement Directorate and Maharashtra's anti-corruption Bureau have been leaked to media and sought transfer of investigations to an independent body.
The petitioner, Sanjay Tiwari, moved a notice of motion before a division bench alleging that reports on the status of probe which were submitted in a sealed cover to the court on December 16 had been published in some newspapers.
It was contended that ED, IT and ACB had submitted reports in a sealed cover to the court which perused them and ordered the reports to be kept again in a sealed cover until March 3 next. The agencies were asked to continue with probe.
The agencies had urged that reports be kept secret till the probe was over. The court also felt that reports should not be disclosed to anyone as probe was underway.
However, newspapers had published findings of the reports which seem to be tilted in favour of the Singh and his family members. The leakage of reports in a section of the press amounted to grave abuse of judicial process and wilful disregard to the orders of court, the petitioner contended.
The petitioner has sought a thorough inquiry into the leakage of reports and action against the guilty. He alleged that leakage of reports indicated that probe was not being held in an impartial manner and sought transfer of investigations to an independent agency.
The notice of motion was mentioned by petitioner's lawyer Mihir Desai before a bench headed by Justice Mohit Shah who decided to hear it on January 13.
Tiwari had filed a PIL against Singh last year linking him to the multi-crore Madhu Koda scandal and demanded a probe into his "unaccountable" assets. The agencies informed the court that they were already conducting a probe. However, the court decided to monitor investigations.
The petitioner alleged that in 2006 when Singh was AICC observer for Jharkhand, he was instrumental in installing Madhu Koda government. PIL alleged that Singh's son is married to daughter of a minister in the then Koda's cabinet. Singh's name surfaced in Koda's diary as a beneficiary, it alleged.
The PIL also alleged that Singh and his family members had multiple bank accounts and he himself has two PAN cards. His wife too has two PAN cards, the petition alleged and listed a series of properties owned by the family.
