Punjab DIG, Ropar Range, Harcharan Singh Bhullar –– currently under suspension –– has moved the Punjab and Haryana High Court against the Union of India and the CBI, seeking quashing of an FIR registered on October 29 last year at the CBI Police Station under the provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
The petition seeks quashing of the FIR on the ground that there is no justifiable legal or factual basis for registration of a criminal case pertaining to disproportionate assets and alleged unjust enrichment against a Punjab cadre police officer employed in connection with the affairs of the State of Punjab.
The petition further contends that the registration of the FIR amounts to a clear abuse of the process of law and is contrary to the principles laid down by the Supreme Court. Directions have also been sought to restrain the CBI and its officials from proceeding further with the investigation arising out of the FIR.
Filed through counsel Tanu Bedi, Vipul Joshi and Ishan Khetarpal, the petition contends that the FIR is liable to be quashed primarily on the ground of “total lack of jurisdiction” with the CBI, which, according to the petitioner, is empowered to investigate specified offences only in Union Territories unless the State concerned consents to investigation of offences committed within its territorial jurisdiction and allegedly by officials employed in connection with its affairs.
It has further been submitted that the petitioner, claiming impeccable credentials and several honours during service, is challenging the registration of the disproportionate assets case as a “sinful transgression” and an affront to the federal structure, which forms part of the basic structure of the Constitution.
It was added that the CBI derives its legal investigative powers entirely from the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act, 1946. The petitioner has further beseeched the court to hold and declare that the jurisdiction of the members of the Delhi Special Police Establishment cannot, under any circumstances, extend beyond a Union Territory or a railway area in the absence of an enabling notification issued by the State Government under the provisions of the Act consenting to such exercise of powers.
It has been added that the Central Government may also, by an order, extend the powers and jurisdiction of the CBI to any State other than a Union Territory, but no such order extending the jurisdiction of the CBI to the State of Punjab exists in the present case.
