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Synopsis

The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the Allahabad High Court's order which directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to probe the charge of accepting bribe against former Uttar Pradesh Ayush minister Dharam Singh Saini, then additional chief secretary, Ayush department, Prashant Trivedi and others in connection with alleged malpractices in the admission to various courses in the department in 2019.

A bench of Justices Dipankar Dutta and Prashant Kumar Mishra suspended the High Court's Lucknow bench order passed last month after hearing Additional Solicitor General K M Nataraj on behalf of the state government.

Nataraj, in his submission, questioned the validity of the order wondering how the CBI probe could be ordered in a plea related to anticipatory bail.

The court, however, asked if the state government was heard on the issue why it should shy away from the CBI in such a large scam.

The state counsel, on this, submitted that this can be done only in a rare case and not in a case of anticipatory bail. He added the High Court could not have used its inherent power to order such a probe.

Nataraj also submitted that the state government here was not challenging the order granting bail for now.

After recording the submission of ASG Nataraj, the court then issued notice to respondent Dr Ritu Garg and stayed the HC order.

In May, a single judge bench of Justice Rajeev Singh, while allowing the bail plea of Dr Garg, had asked the CBI to submit a status report in the matter by August 1 after conducting a probe on registering a regular case.

The court had then gone through a statement by Dr Umakant Singh, the officer in-charge, Ayurveda Directorate, who told the police how kickbacks were paid among the former minister, senior IAS officer Trivedi and other key officials of the Ayush department.

“After looking at such wrongdoings by the authorities for admission in undergraduate and post-graduate courses and that too, in the name of compliance of an order of the apex court, depriving the eligible students, as also on finding grave lapses on the part of the investigating agency, which may have fatal consequences for the justice delivery system, this court cannot simply shut its eyes,” the judge had said.

In her plea, Dr Garg had claimed she was falsely implicated in connection with the National Eligibility-cum-Entrance Test (NEET) 2021-22 fake admissions case. 

The court had then found that the investigating officer had recorded the statement of Umakant Singh, who had categorically stated how corruption was done in 2019 admissions and that Saini had taken Rs 35 lakh at his residence, while Trivedi had taken Rs 25 lakh.

“From a bare perusal of the statement given by Dr Umakant Singh, it is evident that a huge amount of money was usurped by various persons in the admission process of 2019,” the court had said.