Jharkhand High Court dismisses challenge to maintainability of PILs against CM Hemant Soren; to hear case on June 10

The Jharkhand High Court on Friday held maintainable the batch of public interest litigation (PIL) against the State's incumbent Chief Minister Hemant Soren filed on charges of money laundering, embezzlement of funds and granting of mining license. (Shiv Shankar Sharma v. State of Jharkhand and ors) .A Bench of Chief Justice Ravi Ranjan and Justice Sujit Narayan Prasad noted that it was not persuaded to throw way the pleas at the threshold on technical grounds.In dismissing all the objections to the maintainability of the PILs against the CM - which alleged that he indulged in money laundering, embezzled a welfare scheme's funds and granted himself a mining license - the Bench emphasised,"Herein, allegation as per the pleadings available on record is serious in nature, i.e. investment of ill-gotten money through various sources, which is allowed to be laundered at the cost of society jeopardizing interest of the people at large."The Bench has posted the matter for hearing on merits on June 10. .Counsel for the respondents essentially raised the following objections to the PILs:Some of the Jharkhand High Court (Public Interest Litigation) Rules, which are mandatory in nature, were not followed;The petitioner had not furnished the credentials as required, and in particular showed malafide intent by not disclosing the fact that their father was the witness in a criminal case instituted against the Chief Minister, the conviction in which was reversed by the higher judiciary;The writ petitioner directly rushed to the High Court without exhausting the remedy available under the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) with regard to a police complaint/FIR and subsequent questioning and probe;The mining lease in question has been surrendered and no further proceedings are thus warranted.It was emphasised that the High Court ought to first verify the prima facie credentials of the present PIL-petitioner before entertaining the plea..The Bench at the outset emphasised that the material placed on record by the petitioner made clear that he has no personal interest in the instant PILs, either directly or indirectly.On the grounds of technicality in terms of hearing the PILs, the Bench underscored that even if rules have not been strictly followed, "...if there is prima facie material available indicating genuine public interest, the writ petitions should not and cannot be thrown away. The petitioner can be ousted but not be genuine issues raising the public cause. Doing that will frustrate the cause of justice."The High Court noted that the word "shall" used in the concerned procedural rules for filing PILs was not conclusive to determine whether the provision is mandatory or directory. The same, the Bench stated, is,"...ordinarily indicative of mandatory nature but having regard to the context in which it is used or having regard to the intention of the legislation, the same can be construed as directory. The rules of procedure are made to advance the cause of justice and not to defeat it. Construction of the rule or procedure which promotes justice and prevents miscarriage has to be preferred.".Relying on the Supreme Court decision in Chinnammal & Ors v. P Arumugham & Anr and others, the Bench reiterated that procedural law cannot come in the way of substantive justice. In this regard, it observed:"...no man should suffer because of the mistake of the court. No man should suffer a wrong by technical procedure of irregularities. Rules or procedures are the handmaids of justice and not the mistress of the justice."It held that the objection regarding the petitioner's father was not sustainable in law. On the concerned mining lease having now been surrendered, the Bench observed,"It is a different thing that he may have now surrendered the lease. Such being the admitted position, the mala fide point or the issue of biased approach by the writ petitioner would not be acceptable at all. The allegation cannot be said to be a farce. What ultimately would be the fate of the writ petition lies in the womb of morrow but how such petition could be thrown away at the threshold?"As to the fact that remedies under the CrPC were not exhausted before approaching the High Court, the Bench noted that the power to hand over an investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and/or other central agencies is "admittedly not there with the Magistrate", which otherwise hears matter filed through police complaints..Accordingly, the PILs were deemed maintainable. .The High Court Bench was acting on the directions of the apex court, which had, on May 24 this year, directed it to decide upfront the maintainability of the PILs against CM Soren. .A Bench of Justices DY Chandrachud and Bela M Trivedi had stated in its orer,"Since the HC has clearly stated that it would deal with the issue of maintainability upfront, we deem it appropriate that is done without proceeding into the merits of the writ. We accordingly direct that maintainability be decided on next date of hearing based on objections. The High Court may then proceed in accordance in law.".The Jharkhand government had moved the top court challenging the ongoing proceedings in the High Court in the mining lease case against CM Hemant Soren. The CBI was directed to probe the matter after a Bench led by the High Court's Chief Justice relied on a sealed cover report from the Enforcement Directorate (ED). In its order, the Supreme Court noted that there are three PILs tagged before the High Court: one that seeks a direction to the ED to investigate 15 first information reports (FIRs) as to alleged embezzlement of the MNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) funds; one for a probe into investments by the CM's farming company; and a third for sanction of prosecution of the CM for allegedly granting a mining license to himself.The High Court had initially rejected the State's objection to acceptance of the sealed cover report. The Chief Justice-led Bench had directed the State to produce details of the 16 FIRs relating to an alleged MGNREGA scam, and took note of the fact that a Mining Secretary was arrested and suspended in connection with the matters. .Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the State, had submitted before the top court that the PIL-petitioner had a history of filing pleas and testifying against the CM, and was previously convicted for the same. However, this fact, as well as the fact that similar pleas and special leave petitions had earlier been dismissed on merit, was not disclosed. "The High Court has very stringent rules on this, my Lords," Sibal had stated. Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta had said that the current proceedings were initiated by central agencies given who was allegedly involved. "Here higher-ups are involved, so I find it advisable to place it before you so that's there's no travesty of justice. Local police cannot probe [into the] Chief Minister."Pointing to the serious nature of the allegations involved, the SG had voiced his apprehension about evidence possibly being destroyed and said that this was why the ED had submitted its report in a sealed cover. The Bench had pointed out that the matter was heard on a Saturday, to which the SG replied,"If I place the evidence before your lordships, this Court would have done the same."Senior Advocate and former Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi, representing the Chief Minister, submitted that the High Court had clubbed multiple matters and stated that it had unnecessarily heard them during vacations. "Why is it being done specially in this case? Justice should be seen to be done. Lordships have always frowned on sealed covers," Rohatgi had said, pointing to a recent decisions by Benches led the Chief Justice of India about such documents. .Apart from the aforementioned Senior Counsel who appeared before the High Court as well, the following advocates appeared for the parties before the present Bench: Advocate Rajeev Kumar for the PIL-petitioner, Advocate General Rajiv Ranjan with Advocate Piyush Chitresh for Jharkhand, Advocate Rahul Lamba for the Income Tax Investigation Department, Advocate Amritansh Vats for Chief Minister Hemant Soren and his son, Assistant Solicitor-General of India Prashant Pallav for the Central government, and Advocate Amit Kumar Das for the Enforcement Directorate. .[Read judgment]