MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government has filed a petition before the Bombay high court against the CBI to bar any probe or ‘roving inquiry’ into Sachin Waze‘s reinstatement and the cases entrusted to him.
The state wants the HC to quash two paragraphs from the FIR against former home minister Anil Deshmukh that refer to Waze’s reinstatement as assistant police inspector last year, him being assigned most of the ‘sensational cases’, and alleged ‘exercise of undue influence’ over transfers and postings and hence, over performance of police officers’ duties.
The FIR is “clearly intended to carry out a fishing-and-roving inquiry into the administration of the state in order to find out some material enabling political grounds that are presently not in power in the state to try and destabilise” the state government led by CM Uddhav Thackeray, said the petition. The HC will hear the petition on Thursday.
The FIR had invoked Section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act (public servant taking gratification other than legal remuneration in respect of an official act) and Section 120B of Indian Penal Code for criminal conspiracy.
The CBI had registered the case after the HC, on April 5, directed it to conduct a preliminary enquiry into the allegations of corrupt malpractices made by former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh against Deshmukh, as annexed in a complaint filed on March 21 by advocate Jaishri Patil with Malabar Hill police. Singh had, in an eight-page letter to Thackeray on March 20, alleged that Deshmukh met with subordinate police officers, including Waze, in February and asked them to mobilise Rs 100 crore per month from bars, restaurants, hotels and other establishments. Deshmukh had denied the allegations.
The state claimed that the FIR exceeded the “limits permitted” by the HC in its direction, and was “mala fide.” It added that “two unnumbered” paragraphs were “wholly illegal and unauthorised” and the probe must be halted on them. The paragraphs stated: “Enquiry has revealed that Sachin Waze API, Mumbai police had been reinstated …after being off the police service for over 15 years. Enquiry revealed that Waze was entrusted with most of the sensational cases of Mumbai city police and that the then home minister was in knowledge of the fact.”
“Deshmukh and others exercised undue influence over transfer and postings of officials and exercising undue influence over the performance of duties by the officials.”
The state said it is “most strange and shocking that the person who is responsible or who has himself done various acts…” mentioned in these paragraphs relating to Waze “is not made an accused though a person who is allegedly in knowledge of the said fact is made an accused.” “This aspect speaks volumes of the independence and fairness” that the HC expected from the CBI.
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