The Karnataka High Court on Thursday issued notices to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Lokayukta Police and Enforcement Directorate (ED) on a petition challenging the closure of the corruption case against him, his wife PM Parvathi and two others in the Mysore Urban Development Authority (MUDA) land allotment case.
Justice S Sunil Dutt Yadav issued the notices on the petition filed by activist and complainant in the MUDA case, Snehamai Krishna. Krishna challenged the January 28 order of a special Bengaluru court accepting the Lokayukta police closure report in the case.
The case concerns alleged irregularities in land allocation by MUDA. Krishna’s complaint alleged that Siddaramaiah misused his official position to secure undue benefits for his wife.
According to the complaint, Parvathi’s brother gifted her a plot of land that was illegally developed by MUDA. When she complained and asked for compensation, she was given greatly inflated compensation by the state, including 14 replacement lots developed at a value far higher than the original three acres.
On July 26 last year, the Karnataka governor issued a decision to prosecute Siddaramaiah in the case. Siddaramaiah appealed the punishment. On September 24, 2024, Justice M Nagaprasanna of the Supreme Court dismissed Siddaramaiah’s petition.
The Lokayukta police registered a case against Siddaramaiah, Parvathy, his brother-in-law Mallikarjuna Swamy and landowner G Devaraj. It also named former MUDA commissioners GT Dinesh Kumar, DB Natish and realtor Manjunath as accused in the case.
The Lokayukta police filed a report saying they did not find enough evidence to build a corruption case against Siddaramaiah, his wife Swamy and Devaraj. The special court accepted this report on January 28 and observed that the evidence collected during the investigation was insufficient to support the allegations under the Prevention of Corruption Act, or the related provisions of the Indian Penal Code. It allowed the investigation to continue with other defendants.
Krishna’s petition says the special court treated the case as a “routine dispute” and failed to acknowledge the seriousness of the allegations of abuse of constitutional office. He asserted that the court had reflexively relied on the Lokayukta’s conclusions instead of making an independent assessment.
The petition pointed out what it called an “internal inconsistency” in the special court’s order. It says that the court accepted the closure report for some of the defendants while at the same time admitting the violations and directing further investigations against others.
Krishna urged the Supreme Court to transfer the investigation into the MUDA case to an independent agency and order a fresh probe. He asked a retired Supreme Court judge to monitor the investigation.
The petition cited Justice Nagaprasanna’s September 2024 order that upheld the governor’s sentence by prosecuting Siddaramaiah. The order called for a thorough investigation into how the rules were applied in favor of the Siddaramaiah family.
