In an important development, the single bench of justice Sudhanshu Dhulia of Nainital High Court has sought a reply from the Centre to be given in three weeks regarding the CBI probe now going on in the case of sting video that purportedly showed Chief Minister Harish Rawat as seeking to buy back the dissident Congress MlAs. In addition, the petitioner who is the CM himself has been directed to submit rejoinder over the same issue to the court within a week. The next hearing has been fixed on July 19, court sources said.
The court stated that after the completion of preliminary inquiry if things warrant to have a regular case registered the Court will have to be informed by the CBI before an FIR is lodged. It should be mentioned here that CM Rawat had filed a petition in the High Court, appealing to it to stall the ongoing CBI inquiry.
As per the petitioner, the Centre is adamant to get on with the CBI probe despite the state government having withdrawn the approval on CBI inquiry over the same while stating that the State Government is conducting an inquiry into the matter by Special Investigation Team (SIT). On this issue, advocate representing CBI stated that the Centre had again asked them to continue with the probe despite what the State Government had done. The court asked the CBI to file a charge sheet in the court in case a case is registered.