Kerala HC Dismisses CBI's Petition For Early Hearing In LIFE Mission Case

The High Court of Kerala on Tuesday dismissed a petition filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation(CBI) seeking early posting of the petitions filed to quash the CBI FIR in the LIFE Mission case.

When the petition was taken up, a bench of Justice P V Kunhikrishnan asked the CBI's standing counsel if he was ready to argue the matter today. The counsel replied that he needed time to file counter-affidavit in the matter and also to get the date of the Assistant Solicitor General of India, who will argue the matter.

Senior Advocate K V Vishwanathan, who appeared for the State Government, said that the early hearing application, moved before filing the counter-affidavit, was filed to get the attention of the press.

Without making any observation on that, the bench said that the early posting application cannot be considered at the present stage when the CBI was seeking time for filing counter-affidavit and for the appearance of the Assistant Solicitor General.

The bench said that the CBI can seek early posting after filing the counter-affidavit and getting the date of ASG.

Last week, a single bench of Justice V G Arun had stayed the investigation against the CEO of LIFE Mission Project.

The FIR was directly registered by the central agency on a complaint filed by a Congress MLA, Anil Akkara, alleging violations of the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act over the receipt of contributions from the UAE for the construction of apartments for flood-victims under the Kerala Government's LIFE Mission project.

The HC stayed the investigation against the CEO of LIFE Mission for two months after observing that the provisions of the FCRA were not attracted against the government agency.

The Court however did not interfere with the investigation against the builder, Unitac Ltd.

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