Lucknow: A fortnight after ordering a
CBI inquiry in Deputy CMO Y S Sachan death case, the Allahabad
High Court today asked the agency to probe the killing of two
of his seniors, observing that the murders may have been
carried out to put a curtain on UP health department scam.
While also directing the CBI to probe the alleged
irregularities in National Rural Health Mission here, a
Lucknow bench comprising justices Pradeep Kant and Ritu Raj
Awasthi set a three-month deadline for the completion of the
inquiry.
The order came a week after the Mayawati government
had recommended a CBI probe into the murders of the Chief
Medical Officers V K Arya and B P Singh and the health
department scam of which the murders were alleged to be a
fallout.
The bench said that it also cannot be ruled out at
this stage that the death of Sachan in judicial custody was
not the result of the same series of murders having been
planned and carried out to put a curtain on the financial
irregularities committed in implementing the NRHM programme.
The court said the police investigation and the
submission of charge sheets cannot prohibit the CBI from
launching fresh investigations.
"Once this court has already entrusted the
investigation in the case of Dr Sachan to the CBI, an order,
we are told, has been approved by the apex court in a writ
petition filed by Dr Malti Sachan under Article 32 of the
Constitution," it said.
"Since the state government itself has referred the
matters relating to NRHM irregularities committed at Lucknow,
to the CBI and further that since the investigation can be
transferred to the agency even after the submission of
charge sheets, keeping in mind the dictum of the Supreme Court
and the steps taken by the state government, we do feel that
the matters require to be investigated by the CBI thoroughly,"
the court said.
"The Director, CBI, is directed to take charge of the
investigation immediately," the bench said in its order.
The court asked the state to provide all assistance
and logistic support to the CBI. "The investigation shall be
completed expeditiously, say, within a maximum period of three
months."
The bench also directed that no action should be taken
by the magistrate concerned in pursuance of the charge sheets
already submitted.
"We clarify that any observation made in this order,
which may apparently touch the facts under investigation,
would not be taken as opinion of this court on the issues in
question," the bench said.
The court had on last Friday reserved its order on the
pending PIL seeking direction for the CBI probe into the
murder of two CMOs in the state capital.
While CMO Arya was shot dead in October last year, B
P Singh was killed in Gomti Nagar area on April 2 last.
Later on June 22, Dy CMO Sachan, who was named as the
conspirator in Singh`s murder, was also found dead inside the
Lucknow district jail hospital.
PTI
