The ongoing hearing in the quid pro quo cases filed by Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against YSR Congress party president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy seems to have come back to square one.
The Telangana high court on Friday evening issued orders transferring as many as 55 district and sessions court judges from their existing positions to various other courts.
The list includes principal sessions judge of special courts for CBI cases B R Madhusudhan Rao, who has been hearing the cases pertaining to Jagan for the last over three years. He was replaced by 9th additional judge of Kamareddy court Ch Ramesh Babu.
Most of the cases against Jagan pertain to discharge petitions filed by the accused in the case. They are all in the final stages of hearing. Already, hearing has been completed with regard to the petitions of many of the accused. The CBI has to present its arguments opposing these petitions.
Madhusudhan Rao has been hearing Jagan’s cases every Friday. Now that he has been transferred and Ramesh Babu is set to take over the cases, it appears the new judge has to begin the hearing all over again right from the beginning.
According to experts, it had happened in the past, too, when the judges were transferred midway of hearing the cases. If it happens again with regard to Jagan’s cases, the process will have to start again, resulting in unending delay in the case.
Apart from that of Jagan, the special court for CBI cases has been hearing discharge petitions in as many as 11 cases, which include high profile cases of Obulapuram mining and Emaar properties etc.
Arguments have not completed even in a single petition. Some of the cases have been pending since 2012 of which many of them in the stage of framing charges. With the transfer of the sitting judge, the hearing might get delayed indefinitely.
