High Court directs CID not to proceed with probe into case against SEC

Nelapadu (Amaravati): Justice D Ramesh presiding over the single bench of the Andhra Pradesh High Court here on Monday directed the Criminal Investigation Department not to proceed with the investigation into the case filed against the State Election Commissioner Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar.

Justice Ramesh heard the arguments of the counsel for the station election commissioner and the government pleader Sumon in the two quash petitions filed against the First Information Reports (FIRs) registered against the State Election Commissioner and the assistant secretary Samba Murthy of the State Election Commission.

Justice Ramesh during the arguments wondered as to who filed the criminal cases and against whom. "Is there permission to file criminal case against the SEC?" He asked. Earlier, Sumon,

Government Pleader, attached to the Advocate General's office, presenting the arguments stated that the State Election Commission represented by the State Election Commissioner filed a quash petition alleging interference in the independent functioning of the SEC among other grounds to quash the FIR. Moreover, the quash petition was filed by the accused himself.

The Government Pleader also took objection to the maintainability of the writ itself as the SEC is a stranger to the prosecution and he has not been named in the FIR. It's only an

employee of the SEC who has been named and accused of deleting files from the computer. There are many Supreme Court judgments which have held that third parties and strangers cannot seek quash of an FIR.

It was further argued that the SEC cannot speak about its independence in the light of the private meeting the SEC had in a hotel in Hyderabad with certain political leaders.

Also the political leaning of the SEC is quite known in the public. So the writ has to be dismissed, he said. As far as the second writ petition seek