An appeal has been moved in the Supreme Court challenging Uttarakhand High Court ruling which called for a CBI probe into allegations of corruption levelled by a journalist against the State’s Chief Minister, TS Rawat.
The High Court had issued the direction while allowing three writ petitions to quash criminal proceedings against two journalists, Umesh Sharma and Shiv Prasad Semwal.
While quashing an FIR lodged in the matter earlier this year, High Court judge, Justice Ravindra Maithani had opined that there were certain further issues lingering.
The High Court proceeded to take the view that the allegations of corruption levelled against TS Rawat deserve to be probed.Therefore, Justice Maithani directed the Superintendent of Police, CBI Dehradun to register a case to investigate the allegations made by Umesh Sharma in his petition before the Court.
Case Background
In a video released in June this year, Sharma had alleged that an amount of Rs 25 lakh was paid as bribe to Chief Minister Trivendra Singh Rawat by one Amratesh Singh Chauhan for his appointment as Chairman of the Gau Seva Ayog, Jharkhand. TS Rawat was the BJP’s State in-charge of Jharkhand at the time, circa 2016.
This amount was alleged to have been deposited into various bank accounts, including those of Dr Harender Singh Rawat and his wife Savita Rawat. In his June 2020 video, Sharma asserted that Savita Rawat was Trivendra Singh’s sister, making Dr Harender Singh Rawat his brother-in-law.
In an FIR filed filed earlier this year, these allegations were denied by Dr HS Rawat. However, on Tuesday, the High Court quashed this FIR on finding that the alleged offences of cheating, forgery, conspiracy etc. were not made out against Sharma.
