Fisheries scam: Gujarat High Court refuses to quash proceedings against minister

In a major blow to fisheries minister Parshottam Solanki and former agriculture minister Dileep Sanghani, the Gujarat High Court has refused to quash the criminal proceedings initiated against them by a Gandhinagar court in the alleged fisheries scam that runs up to Rs 400 crore. The single judge bench of Justice JB Pardiwala has also refused to withdraw the summons issued against them and directed the duo to appear before the trial court in two weeks.

The court refused to entertain Solanki’s argument that public interest would suffer if a sitting minister of a state was prosecuted, and that the complaint had been filed against him malafide. During the pronouncement of the judgment on Friday, the court remarked that even if it is assumed that the complainant had filed the complaint due to personal animosity, it could not be considered grounds to discard a complaint containing serious allegations, which had to be “tested and weighed” after the evidence was collected.

Justice Pardiwala, who also went through the exhaustive inquiry report in the alleged scam by the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB), remarked: “A close reading of the report reveals more than prima facie case to proceed not only against the sitting fisheries minister but also against the former agriculture minister Dileep Sanghani.”

The judgment pronounced on Friday provides that as per the report, the accused connived with each other and abused their positions, causing a loss of Rs 21.04 crore to the state exchequer over a period of five years by arbitrarily awarding fishing contracts for personal monetary gain.

The court also said it was surprised that the Lokayukta gave a clean chit to the accused, and clarified that there was sufficient material on record to put the BJP leaders on trial.

IRREGULARITIES

The case dates back to 2008 when Solanki, MoS for fisheries, granted fishing contracts to 58 reservoirs without following the mandatory auctioning process, allegedly resulting in a loss of Rs 400 crore to the government exchequer. The complainant, Ishak Maredia, had alleged that Solanki had done so for personal monetary benefits causing a huge loss to the government exchequer. Maredia has been fighting tooth and nail in a long drawn legal battle to get the ministers tried for the alleged offences, in which the state government tried its best to protect the duo.