Anil Deshmukh's plea against FIR: Bombay HC adjourns hearing; refuses to pass interim order

The Bombay High Court on Thursday refused to pass any order on former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukhs request for interim protection from coercive action in connection with an FIR lodged against him by the CBI on corruption chargesA division bench of Justices S S Shinde and Manish Pitale directed the Central Bureau of Investigation CBI to file its affidavit within a period of four weeks in response to the petition filed by Deshmukh seeking to quash the FIRSenior counsel Amit Desai appearing for Deshmukh sought for an interim order granting protection from any coercive action to the NCP leaderThe CBI can file its affidavit to the petition but till then the petitioner should be protected Desai saidCBI counsel Anil Singh however opposed it and said the agency was given a copy of the petition only on Wednesday and hence it requires time to file its affidavitThe court then said the respondent CBI should be given an opportunity to respond to the petitionWe cannot pass any orders without hearing the parties concerned If there is extreme urgency then you Deshmukh can move the vacation bench of the HC You Deshmukh have that liberty the court saidThe bench said if Deshmukh moved the vacation bench then he shall give 48hour notice to the CBIDeshmukh filed the petition in the HC on May 3 challenging the FIR lodged by the CBI on April 21 under section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act dealing with illegal gratification obtained by a public servant and section 120b criminal conspiracy of the Indian Penal CodeIn the petition Deshmukh claimed the FIR could not have been registered without the state governments consentThe plea said the FIR was filed with a biased dubious and ulterior motive at the behest of those having political or other vendetta against himIt further said the FIR makes vague allegations and there is no case made out for illegal gratificationThe CBI had initiated a preliminary enquiry PE against Deshmukh on the HCs order on April 5 based on petitions filed by advocate Jayshri Patil and former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh who levelled allegations of corruption and malpractices against the NCP leaderSingh wrote a letter to Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray in March alleging that Deshmukh had asked API Sachin Waze to collect Rs 100 crore as bribe from bars and restaurants in Mumbai every monthWaze currently under suspension was arrested in March in connection with the National Investigation Agencys NIA probe into the case of recovery of an explosivesladen SUV near industrialist Mukesh Ambanis house in Mumbai and the subsequent murder of Thane businessman Mansukh HiranParam Bir Singh wrote the letter to the CM after he was shifted from the post of Mumbai police commissioner and appointed as the directorgeneral home guardsThe CBI had questioned Deshmukh and conducted searches at his premises The probe agency had also questioned Singh and othersDeshmukh who has rejected the allegations levelled against him resigned as state home minister on April 5 after the HC ordered the preliminary enquiry against himThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever