More than five months after the Andhra Pradesh state high court cancelled the FIR registered by the state Crime Investigation Department (CID) alleging insider trading in land dealings in Amaravati capital region, the Jagan Mohan Reddy government moved the Supreme Court.
On Tuesday, the Jagan government filed a special leave petition in the Supreme Court challenging the high court judgement delivered on January 20 stating that there was no insider trading in Amaravati.
The Supreme Court admitted the SLP and posted the case to three weeks later for hearing, serving notices to the respondents to present their version.
On January 20, a bench of the Andhra Pradesh high court headed by Justice Cheekati Manvendranath Roy rejected the FIR registered by the CID alleging insider trading in the land acquisition in Amaravati.
The CID booked the cases against several leaders including former minister Pratipati Pulla Rao under Sections 420, 406, 409 and 120-B of IPC.
The high court, however, observed that right to acquire property was a constitutional and legal right and since the lands were purchased from the sellers who willingly and voluntarily sold them to the petitioners, the said private sale transactions cannot be criminalized.
The judge also observed that the concept of the offence of insider trading which is essentially an offence in the field of stock market relating to selling and buying the securities and bonds cannot be applied to the offences under Indian Penal Code.
“The said concept of offence of insider trading is totally alien to IPC and it is unknown to our criminal jurisprudence under the Indian Penal Code," the court said.
The CID filed a case that insider trading took place in land dealings in Amaravati, based on the complaint given by one S Suresh, resident of Velagapudi, a village in Amaravati capital region.
The Jagan government alleged that the previous TDP government has indulged in insider trading and persons close to the higher echelons had bought lands in the Amaravati region at cheaper rates before announcing that area as the capital region.
