123 Kolkata: Calcutta High Court on Thursday allowed an appeal petition made by RG Kar ex-principal Sandip Ghosh, accused in the corruption case along with others, against the order of the single bench the day before on Wednesday, dismissing the application for recall/review of the single bench order on Jan 28, 2025.
A division bench of justices Joymalya Bagchi and Subhendu Samanta fixed the matter for hearing on Friday when the bench would pass specific orders on the timeframe for the petitioners to file their response on the CBI charge sheet submitted in Nov 2024, the response of the CBI, if any, a week thereafter.
Counsels for the petitioners submitted that the CBI had on Feb 1, 2025, handed to them an "unindexed and unpaginated" 25,000-page documents while the special CBI court wanted the response of the petitioners in three days on Feb 4, when the BNSS had set a time limit of 60 days to file a discharge application.
"The matter will appear before the court on Friday. In the meantime, I propose that the prosecution and the accused agree to a timeframe for filing their responses," Justice Bagchi said. He also said the bench would monitor the execution of the agreed timeframe. Accused Ghosh had already filed a discharge application.
The CBI counsel submitted that the charge sheet was filed in Nov 2024 and the petitioners were adopting a "dilatory tactic" to delay the framing of charges when the prosecution had a limited three-month time for charge-framing. The CBI counsel also submitted that allegation against petitioners was misappropriation of funds/corruption. "When did you hand down the documents?" Justice Bagchi asked the CBI counsel, who replied that the documents were given on Feb 1. "And the date for the framing of charges was fixed on Feb 4," Justice Bagchi said.
Justice Bagchi clarified by saying that the accused at a point of time should not get the opportunity to point out that they were deprived of their rights under the law. "We don't want a situation where justice hurried becomes justice buried. The court will also ensure that delay in framing of charges does not happen. The trial can proceed on fast track but the elements of law can't be brushed aside," Justice Bagchi said.
Justice Bagchi also reminded the petitioners that the 60-day time limit for filing of discharge applications under the BNSS was directory and not mandatory. "The court can bring it forward in a situation," Justice Bagchi said.
Justice Bagchi then proposed a timeframe to the prosecution and accused and asked them to come prepared on Friday. The bench proposed that the petitioners file their response in a week and the CBI files its, if any, a week thereafter and the court would fix the hearing of the matter after three weeks. "As soon as charges are framed, we will put the onus on CBI to complete the investigation within a timeframe," Justice Bagchi said.
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