Supreme Court dismisses plea against CBI probe of Deshmukh case

Maharashtra had argued that central agency could not conduct an impartial investigation

The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed Maharashtra's appeal to transfer a CBI investigation into former State home minister Anil Deshmukh to a Special Investigation Team as a "complete red herring".

"We do not want to touch this case. Dismissed," a Bench led by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul told senior advocate Aryama Sundaram, for Maharashtra. Mr. Sundaram had argued that the CBI cannot conduct an impartial investigation into the police transfers and postings case against Deshmukh with Subodh Kumar Jaiswal as the CBI Director.

Maharashtra submitted at the outset that Mr. Jaiswal was the Director General of Police and part of the Police Establishment Board which oversaw the transfer and postings. A central agency headed by the same man cannot investigate the case. It would be like a man investigating his own conduct.

"The present director of CBI at relevant time was the Chairman of the establishment board responsible for transfer. He will either be possibly an accused or definitely a witness. I am not going into likelihood of bias, a person who is relevant as a witness or an accused, he was directly involved," Mr. Sundaram argued.

The Bombay High Court had in December last year dismissed similar petitions by Maharashtra for forming an SIT to probe the corruption case against Deshmukh on the ground that the CBI probe was not impartial.