By Our Legal Correspondent
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Nov 20 restored the criminal proceedings against former Minister and MLA Antony Raju in an over three-decade –old case of forging and planning material evidence.
Mr Raju was accused of tampering with the material evidence , an underwear of an Australian national, Andrew Salvatore, whom he was representing as a junior lawyer, in narcotic drugs case reported in 1990.
“The case at hand involves serious allegations of interference with judicial processes which strike at the very foundation of both dispensation and the administration of justice,” a Bench of Justices C T Ravikumar and Sanjay Karol observed in the judgment.
Justice Karol said the case in which the alleged tampering occurred was under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, and hence serious. “The changes involved forgery of evidence. There should not be any protection given to the accused against criminal proceedings”.
The Supreme Court ordered the Judicial First Class Court in Nedumangad(Kerala) to complete the trial in a year. Mr Raju was ordered to appear before the trial court on December 20.
The Australian citizen was arrested from the international airport in Thiruvananthapuram on charges of carrying hashish and the prosecution had produced an underwear as part of the evidence against him saying the contraband was smuggled in that. The Australian citizen was sentenced to ten-years of rigorous imprisonment. However, he was acquitted by the High Court of Kerala in 1993 after his counsel proved that the underwear was too small for him. Mr Raju was the lawyer of the accused in the drug case.
A vigilance inquiry led to the registration of an FIR against the court clerk and Mr Raju in 1994 accusing them of having conspired together with the intention and preparation to cause the disappearance of evidence. It was stated specifically against Mr Raju that he made “alterations” to ensure that the underwear did not fit to Salvatore.
“Such incidents strike at the foundation of the independence and integrity of the judicial process,” Justice Karol observed , while upholding the locus stand of Mr Ajayan, a public spirited citizen had filed the appeal in the Supreme Court.
