Jayalalithaa won’t be declared convict: Supreme Court

“Applications for personal hearing of review petitions before the court are rejected. We have considered the review petitions filed by the State of Karnataka on merits. In our opinion, no case for review of our order dated February 14, 2017 is made out. Consequently, the review petitions are dismissed on merits,” a bench of Justices PC Ghose and Amitava Roy said. 

The Karnataka government had on March 21 moved the Supreme Court against its February 14 judgement contending that once the proceedings were abated, it would not be possible to recover the fine of Rs 100 crore imposed on the late leader which was part of the punishment awarded to her in the case. 

The Supreme Court had on February 14 convicted AIADMK chief VK Sasikala and two others in the case, while abating proceedings against Jayalalithaa as she had died. The court had, however, made clear that the fine imposed on her can be recovered. 

The Supreme Court had restored the special trial court verdict convicting all the accused and set aside the Karnataka HC judgement in the case. The trial court had found disproportionate assets valued at Rs 53.60 crore, which Jayalalithaa and the three others could not account for. The CBI had alleged that the unaccounted wealth was to the tune of Rs 66.65 crore. 

In its review plea, the state government had contended that the top court’s decision to abate the proceedings against Jayalalithaa was an ‘error apparent on the face of record’. The plea had said that the abatement of proceedings was ‘erroneous’ as there was no provision either in the Constitution or the Supreme Court rules for it.