The Supreme Court (SC) on Friday issued notice on the petition filed by Lilavati Hospital Trust challenging the recent judgment of the Bombay High Court (HC) quashing a criminal case against HDFC Bank Managing Director and CEO Sashidhar Jagdishan for allegedly receiving illegal payments from the trust.
A bench of Justices MM Sundresh and N Koteswar Singh passed the order on a petition filed by Lilavati Kirtilal Mehta Medical Trust and its permanent secretary Prashant Kishore Mehta challenging the HC’s May 5 ruling, and issued notice to Jagdeeshan asking him to respond during the next hearing.
The Trust has filed a criminal case against Jagdishan for allegedly colluding with former trustees and receiving approx $2.05 crore as illegal payment between March 16, 2022 and June 21, 2023. The trust, represented by senior advocate Siddharth Luthra along with advocate Gaurav Goel, stated that the HC had exceeded its jurisdiction by holding that the complaint against Jagdeeshan was a fallout of recovery proceedings initiated against the trust and continued to be quashed.
Luthra said the apex court observed “callousness, mistrust and strained relations” between the former and present trustees of the charitable hospital and considered the matter as a private dispute without appreciating the serious economic crimes of theft and diversion of funds from a prominent medical charity.
“The ruling has resulted in premature interdiction of an ongoing investigation at a nascent stage, despite substantial incriminating material having already been collected during the investigation,” Luthra stated, adding that independent proceedings seeking to probe the larger financial conspiracy and diversion of trust funds are pending in another FIR.
Since this case was specifically related to allegations of misappropriation of trust funds by an individual, the FIR was quashed even before the accused was subjected to custodial interrogation and confronted with documentary material. The bench said that this part of the investigation could be considered in other FIRs even while noting that it was not inclined to interfere with the HC’s judgement.
Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi appearing for Jagdishan said the HC rightly noted the growing friction between the larger Mehta family and stated that the allegations in the FIR lacked any substantive substance.
An FIR was lodged against Jagdeeshan at Bandra police station under various offenses involving cheating and criminal breach of trust under the Indian Penal Code (now replaced by BNS). The trust was also hurt by the HC’s refusal to order an investigation by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) which failed to notice how repeated complaints to the police authorities and the Anti-Corruption Bureau yielded no results forcing the trust to approach the local court which directed registration of the FIR in May 2025.
“The refusal to conduct an independent investigation by the CBI despite acknowledged police inaction, the destruction of records, allegations of corruption involving influential banking officials, and forensic findings of widespread financial irregularities, has led to a serious miscarriage of justice and undermined public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the criminal investigation,” the petition said.
The HC ruling said, “The complaint is a result of the fallout of recovery proceedings initiated by the petitioner financial institutions against the Lilavati Trust… as of today dues amounting to $65 Crores so far
“To heal.”
The petitioners alleged that these recovery proceedings led to the death of their father. “There is serious acrimony, mistrust and relations strained to the core between former secretaries and current secretaries,” the High Commissioner said.
In these circumstances, it concluded that “a personal vendetta written in the face of restitution proceedings is something we strongly consider to be a reason for intervention. To continue investigating these facts and circumstances would be nothing short of an abuse of court process.”
The Supreme Court is now expected to hear the matter in August.
