BS Yediyurappa gets relief from SC in corruption case

Bengaluru, July 22: Former Karnataka Chief Minister BS Yediyurappa on Friday got a relief from the Supreme Court which has put on hold criminal proceedings in a corruption cases against him.

The Karnataka High Court had refused to cancel an FIR registered against Yediyurappa, who is accused of a land allocation scam.

Yediyurappa is accused of denotifying acres of land illegally in 2006-7, when he was Deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka.

The case pertains to the denotification of prime land in Bellandur and Devarabeesanahalli, which was related to Varthur-Whitefield IT Corridor.The land was acquired in 2000-2001 for an IT park.

However, in 2006-07, as the Deputy Chief Minister in the JD(S)-BJP coalition government headed by H D Kumaraswamy, Yediyurappa denotified the land according to the private complaint lodged by Vasudeva Reddy with the Lokayukta court alleging irregularities in the denotification.

In December 2020, Yediyurappa had filed a petition in the High Court seeking quashing of the case.

Yediyurappa had contended that the High Court had quashed the same FIR against the then Industries minister and Congress leader R V Deshpande on October 9, 2015.

Hence, the investigation against him based on the same FIR was illegal but the court rejected his argument.

Dismissing the petition, Justice John Michael Cunha directed the police to intensify the investigation.

The Lokayukta police had filed a 'B Report' seeking closure of the investigation which Reddy had challenged.