Ballari: It's almost three years since the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) completed its investigation and filed chargesheets in eight cases of illegal mining at the CBI courts in Bengaluru, but the trial has not begun in any of the cases.
“All the cases are in ‘pre-charge stage’ or ‘hearing before the charges’ stage. The court has to frame charges and only then can trials begin," an official source said, pointing out that the frequent change of judges at the CBI courts is hampering the process of framing charges against the accused.
Five courts in Bengaluru deal with the cases investigated by the Bengaluru branch of CBI. Of them, three courts are hearing the illegal mining cases. “In the last three years, the CBI courts dealing with mining cases have seen five judges and this frequent change is the prime reason behind the delay in beginning the trials. Each judge has not had more than one to one-and-a-half years of term,” an official source said.
“A judge is transferred before he understands the case in depth, and the new judge who assumes charge will again start the hearing from the beginning. Though it is a prerequisite, it is a tough and lengthy exercise to hear arguments and counter-arguments of each and every accused. Each case has 30 to 50 accused,” the source said.
“It takes at least two to three hearings for one accused and it consumes two-three weeks and then hearing charges against all the accused takes one year. It obviously delays the beginning of trial and bringing the case to a logical end,” the source said.
While passing orders for a CBI probe into illegal mining cases, the Supreme Court had asked for day-to-day hearing. “But, it's not happening at present. The apex court had also asked the state to ensure that the judges sitting on these cases should not be disturbed until charges were framed against each accused," a senior officer said.
The CBI has filed chargesheets in the mining bribery case involving BJP state president B.S. Yeddyurappa and steel tycoon Sajjan Jindal, M/s Associated Mining Company case involving former minister Gali Janardhan Reddy and his wife, five separate cases related to export of illicit iron ore from Belekeri port involving BJP MLA from Hosapete B.S. Anand Singh, independent MLA from Kudligi B. Nagendra, BSR Congress MLA from Kampli T.H. Suresh Babu, independent MLA from Karwar Satish Sail and M/s Deccan Mining Syndicate (DMS) involving senior IAS officer Shamim Banu and its owner Rajendra Jain.
Interestingly, in the case of Rs 1,232-crore M/s Deccan Mining Syndicate mining scam, all the accused including retired IAS officer Shamim Banu and company's owner Rajendra Jain have been discharged at the stage of “hearings before charge”. But the CBI is now reportedly awaiting clearance from the Directorate of Prosecution under the Ministry of Law and Justice to challenge the dropping of charges against all the accused in the case.
