The Special Court for Elected Representatives ordered a Lokayukta police probe against former Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa on a private complaint filed by T.J. Abraham, activist, on Wednesday. This is the first high profile probe referred to the Lokayukta police after the Anti-Corruption Bureau was wound up and powers to probe cases under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, restored to the Lokayukta police.
Hearing the private complaint earlier, the special court observed that “there are some material to refer the complaint for investigation” against Mr. Yediyurappa and others on the allegation of receiving ₹12.5 crore as bribe from a construction firm in connection with a housing project tendered by Bangalore Development Authority (BDA), on the grounds that there was no sanction for prosecution.
However, the High Court of Karnataka on September 7 held that there was no need for sanction for prosecution for the special court to order a probe. Following this, the private complaint came up for hearing again in the special court on Wednesday, when the court directed the Lokayukta police to carry out the probe into the case.
The complaint names Minister S.T. Somashekar, the then BDA Commissioner and IAS officer G.C. Prakash, Chandrakanth Ramalingam of Ramalingam Construction Company Pvt. Ltd., Mr. Yediyurappa’s son-in-law Virupakashappa Yamakanamaradi, his son Shashidhar Maradi and his (Mr. Virupakashappa’s) son-in-law Sanjay Sree, apart from Mr. Yediyurappa.
