Supreme Court Dismisses Karnataka DyCM D K Shivakumar's Plea To Quash CBI Disproportionate Assets Case

The Supreme Court dismissed a petition by Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar on Monday, challenging the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)’s case against him for allegedly possessing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income, a report by the Hindustan Times has stated.

A bench comprising Justices Bela M Trivedi and Satish Chandra Sharma found no merit in the Congress leader’s plea, stating there was no justification for the court to interfere with the case. “How could the proceedings be quashed against you? This is a case under the Prevention of Corruption [PC] Act...We are not going to quash it,” the bench told senior counsel Mukul Rohatgi, representing Shivakumar.

Rohatgi argued that the case against his client was registered without prior approval from the state government under Section 17A of the PC Act, which protects public servants from prosecution for decisions made as part of their official duties. This section was introduced through an amendment effective from July 26, 2018.

However, the bench highlighted that the issue of prior sanction had been referred to a larger bench due to a split judgment by a two-judge bench of the Supreme Court in January 2024.

The judges had disagreed on whether the need for approval under Section 17A applied to all pending cases or only those registered after the amendment came into effect.

“As and when that question is decided by the larger bench, your matter will also get decided. How can your case be quashed based on a split judgment? We are not interfering right now,” the bench responded to Rohatgi.

Rohatgi further requested the bench to examine whether the same event could lead to multiple FIRs, noting that the Income Tax Department, Enforcement Directorate (ED), and the CBI had filed separate cases based on a 2017 raid by tax authorities.

The bench disagreed, stating, “These are different offences under different statutes. The Income Tax authorities cannot prosecute under the PC Act,” and dismissed Shivakumar’s petition.

The CBI filed an FIR against Shivakumar in October 2020 on charges of corruption, following sanction from the B S Yediyurappa-led BJP government on September 25, 2019. This action stemmed from Income Tax Department searches in August 2017 at around 70 premises linked to Shivakumar.

The CBI alleged that Shivakumar accumulated wealth amounting to ₹74.93 crore, disproportionate to his known sources of income, between April 2013 and April 2018, while serving as the energy minister in the Congress-led Karnataka government.

On April 20, 2023, a single judge of the Karnataka High Court rejected Shivakumar’s plea to quash the sanction given by the BJP government on September 25, 2019, which Shivakumar argued was merely consent and not a formal sanction. The High Court also dismissed Shivakumar’s plea to quash the entire CBI case on October 19, 2023, granting the CBI three months to complete its investigation.

The High Court noted that the investigation was based on extensive documents and evidence collected by the Income Tax department, ED, and CBI, and rejected Shivakumar’s contention that the FIR was registered with “malafide and political malice.”

In March this year, the top court quashed another case against Shivakumar under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) related to the 2017 tax raid, based on its November 2023 ruling that a criminal conspiracy under Section 120B of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) cannot solely justify a money-laundering probe.

Shivakumar, arrested by the ED in September 2019 and released on bail a month later, faced a CBI investigation requested by the ED to the BJP-led Karnataka government in 2019.

Although the Karnataka Cabinet decided to withdraw the sanction for the CBI probe in November 2023, the CBI challenged this decision, which is currently under consideration by the high court.