The Madhya Pradesh High Court has directed Congress leader K.K. Mishra, the complainant in a case of an alleged pension scam at Indore Municipal Corporation, to file a fresh application for getting the prosecution sanction against then mayor Kailash Vijayvargiya and others.
A High Court bench of Justice Subodh Abhyankar, in its order passed on September 23, also directed the State chief secretary to pass a “reasoned and speaking order” in the matter within three months.
A special court here had last month closed the 2005 case of alleged pension scam at the Indore Municipal Corporation (IMC) as the M.P. government did not give sanction to prosecute BJP general secretary Vijayvargiya and others for 17 years.
Complainant Mr. Mishra, who is the chairman of the M.P. Congress's media department, had moved the HC against the delay in the grant of sanction. The HC gave its directive on September 23 on a petition filed by Mr. Mishra. A copy of the order was made available on Monday.
It disposed of the petition filed by Mr. Mishra on the alleged pension scam with a direction to him to file a fresh application/representation within a period of two weeks along with earlier application and other relevant documents before the Madhya Pradesh chief secretary.
The HC also said the State chief secretary "shall decide the same expeditiously, possible preferably within a period of three months from the date of receipt of the certified copy of this order, in accordance with law by passing a reasoned and speaking order".
During arguments on Mr. Mishra's petition, the government's counsel said the representation pertaining to sanction of prosecution shall be decided expeditiously.
The special court in Indore had closed the alleged pension scam case against the then mayor (Mr. Vijayvargiya) and other public servants on August 29, as the State government did not give its sanction to prosecute them.
Mr. Mishra alleged that when Mr. Vijayvargiya was Indore’s mayor from 2000 to 2005, the IMC paid pensions to the destitute, widows and disabled persons through co-operative institutes instead of national banks and post offices, as required by rules.
Persons who were ineligible or deceased or even non-existing persons got a pension, causing a loss of ₹33 crore to the government, the Congress leader had alleged.
