New Delhi, Oct 1: The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear on Tuesday a plea of TDP leader N Chandrababu Naidu challenging the Andhra Pradesh High Court order dismissing his petition for quashing the FIR against him in connection with an alleged scam in the Skill Development Corporation.
A bench of justices Aniruddha Bose and Bela M Trivedi will take up the plea for hearing on October 3.
On September 27, the top court had said it would not restrain the trial court from dealing with a plea seeking police custody of Naidu as it announced that a new bench will hear his petition for quashing the FIR in the alleged Rs 371 crore scam in the state.
The plea by Naidu, who was arrested in the case on September 9, had come up before two benches in the top court but without any effective hearing.
Initially, it came up before the designated bench of justices Sanjiv Khanna and SVN Bhatti, but the latter recused himself from hearing the matter on Wednesday.
Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, appearing for the TDP leader, then rushed to the bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud for an urgent hearing on Naidu’s plea in view of the holidays during the week.
The CJI Chandrachud-led bench said that a new bench will hear Naidu’s plea.
The top court, which closed on September 28, will resume functioning on October 3.
Naidu, 73, was arrested for allegedly misappropriating funds from the Skill Development Corporation when he was the chief minister in 2015, causing a purported loss of Rs 371 crore to the state exchequer. His judicial remand has been extended by the trial court till October 5.
The CID in its remand report alleged Naidu “indulged in a criminal conspiracy with the intention of fraudulent misappropriation or otherwise conversion of government funds for his own use, disposal of property which was under the control of a public servant, besides engaging in cheating, forging documents and destroying evidence”. (PTI)
