HC refuses to discharge driver for misusing govt vehicle

PTI, Nov 21, 2022, 6:35 PM IST

The High Court of Karnataka has refused to discharge one of the accused in a case wherein the Vidhana Soudha (State Legislature) and its vehicles were used to cheat a businesswoman.

One of the accused in the case, Sathisha B M who was a driver in Vidhana Soudha approached the court seeking to discharge him in the case against him.

The court said since the trial was on for three years and his involvement is deep, the case against him cannot be quashed.

Sathisha’s petition came up before Justice M Nagaprasanna who gave his judgement on November 2. The complainant in the case is S Indira from Coimbatore.

It was alleged that Ramesh, who was known to Indira through her brother, approached her in December 2018 for borrowing Rs 100 crore for cashew business and sought her help to obtain a loan from a bank.

Indira approached Ilamadi from Andhra Pradesh for help. She was told to arrange Rs 1.12 crore as stamp duty. The money was allegedly transferred, but no loan was provided nor the amount returned. The complaint thus came to be filed.

Sathisha is accused of having driven around the main accused and the complainant in the government vehicle. The meetings also took place in Vidhana Soudha.

Sathisha is now an accused in the case pending before a trial court. After it refused to discharge him from the case in 2019, he approached the High Court.

Rejecting the petition of Sathisha for discharge, the High Court said, “The issue now is not with regard to the merit of the matter concerning any of the accused. The police after investigation have filed a charge sheet. In the charge sheet, the petitioner is arrayed as accused. The complaint specifically narrates the alleged incident and statements of witnesses recorded indicate that it was the petitioner who had taken the accused and complainant around.” The court noted that “he has mis-utilised government vehicles, as he was a driver attached to the Legislature Home and had driven the car belonging to the Secretariat for these illegal activities. In the light of this allegation, the order of the court declining to discharge the petitioner from array of accused cannot be found fault with. It is for the petitioner to come clean in the trial.” Dismissing the petition, it said, “It is trite law that during consideration of application for discharge, though the Court is required to apply its mind and look into the evidence, since the court has in fact considered what is necessary to be considered for discharge, I do not find any merit to interfere with the order passed by the court, moreso, in the light of the fact that after the order of rejection of application for discharge dated August 19, 2019, three years have passed by and the trial has progressed considerably since.”