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Court rejects SLP in Amitabh land case

Legal Correspondent

This is a case of manipulation: counsel

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday rejected at the admission stage itself a special leave petition (SLP) filed by the Uttar Pradesh government against a judgment of the Allahabad High Court that refused to order a probe into the ‘Barabanki land deal’ involving actor Amitabh Bachchan.

A Bench, comprising Chief Justice K. G. Balakrishnan and Justice Aftab Alam, dismissed the SLP after hearing senior counsel K. K. Venugopal for the State and senior counsel Harish Salve for the actor.

The Chief Justice told Mr. Venugopal that the High Court had only said that as the actor had given up his claim over the land there was no point in conducting an investigation against him.

On December 11, 2007, the High Court held that there was no finding that the actor “himself committed any fraud or manipulated any surreptitious entry in the revenue records.”

Mr. Venugopal contended that this was a case of manipulation and forgery of revenue records, which ultimately benefited Mr. Bachchan with the title for the land of 4.142 hectares, and it needed to be investigated.

The Chief Justice told counsel, “if at all there has to be an enquiry, it should be only against the officials, for Mr. Bachchan has no access to the revenue records.”

Counsel said: “The notion that no person is above the law perhaps does not apply to Mr. Bachchan as the police has not been allowed to hold a criminal probe into the alleged fraud and forgery committed in the land deal.”

The Supreme Court should at least allow the criminal investigation to continue on the entries in the revenue records. A wrong signal would go out to the public if the criminal investigation was not ordered.

Enquiry opposed

Mr. Salve opposed any enquiry, contending that it was a ‘regime revenge’ case. He said if any investigation was ordered then Mr. Bachchan would be harassed.

The High Court had disposed of Mr. Bachchan’s petition that challenged the order of the Additional Commissioner of Faizabad quashing the allotment of the land to Mr. Bachchan in Daulatpur village of Barabanki district.

The High court held that no proceedings, either civil, revenue or criminal, should be initiated against Mr. Bachchan in relation to the land in question. The SLP was against this judgment.

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