The apex court said the DA case against Mayawati was "unwarranted" and the agency proceeded against her without properly understanding its orders which were confined to Taj Corridor case relating to the release of Rs 17 crore by UP government allegedly without sanction.
A bench of justices P Sathasivam and Deepak Mishra said that various Supreme Court orders pertained to initiating probe against state government officials in the scam and there was no such direction to lodge another FIR "exclusively" against Mayawati for allegedly amassing assets isproportionate to her known sources of income.
"We hold that in the absence of any specific direction from this Court in the order dated September 18, 2003 or any subsequent orders, the CBI has exceeded its jurisdiction in lodging the FIR," the bench said adding "the impugned FIR is without jurisdiction and any investigation pursuant thereto is illegal and liable to be quashed, accordingly quashed."
In the very begining of it 34-page judgement, the bench made it clear that it was just deciding whether DA case lodged by the CBI is beyond the scope of the directions passed by the apex court in 2003 in Taj Corridor case and it did not go into the merit of allegations made by agency against the former Chief Minister.
The apex court said there is no finding in the CBI's status report of September 2003 pertaining to disproportionate assets of Mayawati.
"We are satisfied that there was no such finding or satisfaction recorded by this Court in the matter of disproportionate assets of the petitioner on the basis of the status report September 11, 2003," the bench said. MORE