Corrupt get away. Abettor not.
SC slashes immunity for corrupt babus
Dhananjay Mahapatra | TNN
New Delhi: Corrupt public servants with godfathers in the ruling class are accustomed to the escape hatch of the government, stalling sanction for their prosecution. But here’s something for them to worry about. The Supreme Court has ruled that there’s no need for any sanction to prosecute those accused of abetting corruption.
The judgment was delivered by a bench of Justices R V Raveendran and B Sudershan Reddy while deciding an interesting question—while sanction for prosecution of an official was mandatorily required for offences under Sections 7, 10, 11, 13 and 15 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, would it also be needed afresh if he abets any of crimes mentioned in these sections? ‘Courts can’t decide what law should be’
New Delhi: Parmeshwaran Subramani, a public servant, was accused of purchasing flats for customs officials at an exorbitant price. After government sanction, the CBI had initiated prosecution. During the pendency of the probe, Subramani allegedly tried to bribe the investigating officer to close the case and so abetted another crime relating to corruption.
The CBI booked him for the second offence too. But the case was quashed by the Goa bench of the Bombay HC on the grounds that there was no prior sanction for prosecution. The CBI appealed in the Supreme Court. The SC termed the HC’s interpretation “wholly erroneous’’. It said when Section 19 of the anti-corruption law specifically omits Section 12 (abetment of corruption) from the purview of the sanction clause, the HC could not have ruled that it was required.
“The courts by process of interpretation cannot read Section 12 into Section 19 as it may amount to rewriting the very Section 19 itself,’’ said Justice Reddy, who authored the judgment on behalf of the bench. “It is a settled law that where there is no ambiguity and the intention of the legislature is clearly conveyed, there is no scope for the court to undertake any exercise to read something into the provisions which the legislature in its wisdom consciously omitted. Such an exercise if undertaken by the courts may amount to amending or altering the statutory provisions,’’ it said. “Courts have to decide what the law is and not what it should be.’’
