The Supreme Court on Friday saw Centre’s stiff resistance to its demand seeking for a sealed cover report on the progress of investigation into the PNB loan scam involving diamantaire Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi, who failed to repay huge sums of loans to the tune of over Rs 13,000 crore and fled the country evading arrest.
Hearing a PIl filed by two public interest litigants, Vineet Dhanda and Ml Sharma, the Bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra, Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud told Attorney General KK Venugopal to inform about the status of probe in a sealed cover.
Opposing such a demand, Venugopal questioned whether any ground was made out by the PIl petitioners suggesting that the probe was faulty. Without that being so, he opposed in principle any move to entertain monitoring of the case by any court, including the highest court. On the previous date of hearing, A-G had sought dismissal of the PIls on the ground that the petitioners were busy bodies having no interest in the case.
"What is the justification for any court to seek a report in a sealed cover and see whether the enquiry is being properly conducted unless someone comes with a specific grievance about the investigationIJ There cannot be a parallel investigation by the Courts," A-G said. He further put to the Court that no petitioner can simply question a probe as it demoralises the investigation agencies and raised doubts on their functioning.
Even before the Court could form a view, the petitioner's lawyer JP Dhanda interrupted by accusing the A-G of not having read his petition. This irked the bench which felt that the language used in court must be "decorous" and "appropriate".
The language used by Dhanda was clearly off the mark as the bench remarked, "Your statement cannot be justified as you presume the A-G has not read the brief. Meet law with law" and put off the case hearing to April 9.