Jagan camp has been carpet-bombing courts against Chandrababu and co with courts as the battlefield. The latest weaponry in its ammo are two petitions separately in Supreme Court and High Court, both aimed at driving Naidu-Ramoji duo against the legal wall.
Y S Vijaya filed a petition in the apex court on Monday with an extraordinary plea to shift the case against the TDP chief to a court in any other state or to the Supreme Court. We have strong reservations about the fairness of the Andhra Pradesh High Court in dealing with this case, the petition argued.
The other petition is also a surprise development. ABK Prasad, a senior journalist, moved in the HC an ‘implead’ petition in Naidu’s ‘vacate’ petition hearing, arguing that he had intimate knowledge of illegal business practices adopted by Ramoji Rao. ABK, who was chairman of Official Language Commission during YSR regime, impleaded along with Vijaya Sai Reddy, Jagan’s auditor and accused in Jagan’s case.
Vijaya alleged in her petition to SC that Chandrababu and others in the case have been trying to create obstacles for a fair trail in the High Court and have been making efforts through ‘not before’ convention to influence the selection of the bench. It may be recalled that Sakhshi and Vijaya’s lawyers objected to a bench consisting of Justice Eswaraih hearing the case earlier.
Presently, the case is being heard by the bench consisting Justice Rohini and Justice Ashutosh Mohanta. Vijaya lawyer Sushil Kumar, in his arguments, has been saying that Justice Rohini had earlier issued orders that were favourable to Chandrababu in some cases.
It would be interesting to see how the apex court will react to this unprecedented move in the history of AP High Court. Vijaya’s petition clearly conveys that the AP High Court is far from competent in delivering justice.
ABK’s case is very curious. The maverick journalist worked very briefly – 1974-1975- in Eenadu. That was a long time ago and too brief a period to know about the businesses of Ramoji Rao in such detail as he claims to have knowledge of. His being drawn into the case is being seen as an attempt to bolster the credentials of Vijaya’s petition.
However, what prompted him to be Jagan’s partner in this case against Ramoji is inexplicable. Jagan has had the credit of drawing Ramoji’s son Suman and the media baron’s co-brother Appa Rao at different stages in the past in his battle against Eenadu.
