BANGALORE: The High Court on Tuesday granted bail to former chief minister B S Yeddyurappa, who was named in the private complaint-3 with regard to denotification of land at Agara, Rachenhalli and Uttarahalli in favour of Bhagat Home Private Limited run by his family members.Hearing Yeddyurappa’s bail plea, Justice B V Pinto allowed his petition and granted conditional bail to Yeddyurappa and former minister S N Krishnaiah Setty, and observed that all the documents submitted by complainant Sirajin Basha were not certified. Justice Pinto also observed that the lower court had not considered whether the documents submitted by the complainants were verified and scrutinised.When the counsel for the complainant stated that the documents were certified and pointed out that not only had the Governor looked into them before according permission but the Lokayukta court too had accepted them before taking cognizance, Justice Pinto sought to know where in the statement was this mentioned. The judge began dictating orders after the respondents failed to furnish details and observed, “The complainant in his sworn statement recorded before the lower court, has not averred that the documents furnished by him are ‘true’. Under these circumstances, the documents should not have been taken into consideration. Therefore, there is no impediment in granting bail to the accused.”Observing that the offence was made up on the basis of an oral statement, Justice Pinto stated that the complainant has also not produced any witnesses. “Mere reading of the sworn statement does not make one guilty,” the judge said.Allowing the contentions of the counsel for the petitioner, who had stated that denotification of government lands is permissible under Section 48 of the Land Acquisition Act, the court said, “No fault can be made against the accused and the offences under this Act are not punishable.” The judge observed that the sworn statement by the complainant does not disclose any offence under provisions of IPC 405, 406, 120b and Section 13(1)d, 13(1)e of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Stating that the Karnataka Land Use Restriction Act, under which an offence was sought to be made against Setty for conversion of agricultural land into non-agricultural use, was also not a punishable offence under the law, Justice Pinto rejected the contention of the complainants that offences committed by the accused invited life imprisonment. Granting Setty bail, Justice Pinto observed, “Both the accused have no antecedents of crime nor any case pending against them.”
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