Chief Minister N. Kiran Kumar Reddy has made it clear to ministers that the state government can not file an affidavit or furnish replies to the Special Leave Petition before the Supreme Court as it has not been made a party to the Jagan illegal assets case. He advised the six ministers and the bureaucrats to file replies in the event they got notices from SC in their individual capacities. The CM, however, assured them that a team of legal experts would go through all the records and note-files pertaining to the issuing of 29 GOs as mentioned in the SLP and the case history in both the Nampally ACB Court and the AP High Court. The experts would prepare a ‘draft’ so that they can accordingly proceed with their replies.
Some of the ministers against whom the SLP was filed met the CM on Tuesday and discussed the follow-up action to be taken. They reportedly felt that there was still some clarity needed on Monday’s SC decision wherein it had only mentioned “issue of notice”. It is not clear whether a notice will be issued only to the CBI to reply to the SLP or “notices” will be served against the ministers and bureaucrats.
“Until we receive any communication we are not in a position to say anything now, but in case we receive any notices from the SC, we will file our replies accordingly,” said Dr J. Geeta Reddy. But confusion exists on the possible replies by the ministers and bureaucrats. “If we say all the GOs pertaining to my ministry were bona fide, the case against Mr Jagan Mohan Reddy with the main charge of quid-pro-quo investments will be watered down; if we agree that all was done to favour him, we may also go to jail along with Jagan Mohan Reddy, it is a catch-22 situation for us; anyway we are seeking legal experts’ opinions on this how to overcome this stalemate' said a minister.
Meanwhile a strong defence was orchestrated by the Congress on Tuesday with ministers Vatti Vasanth Kumar, Erasu Pratap Reddy and Congress legal luminary-turned legislator Gade Venkata Reddy and others saying that there was no need for the ministers to resign just because the SC issued notices to them. They have also rejected the Opposition’s demand for tabling all the 26 GOs with the note files before the Assembly Speaker. “If they had for asked a discussion on the GOs, we would have happily allowed it but same Telugu Desam leaders went to the High Court and made the whole issue sub-judice, we cannot help in this case,” said Mr Vatti Vasanth Kumar.
Mr Gade Venkata Reddy said both NT Rama Rao and Mr Chandrababu Naidu had not bothered to resign from their posts for several indictments by the AP High Court on several occasions.