The alleged meeting between West Bengal BJP MLA Suvendu Adhikari and Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta has stirred up a hornet’s nest. The Trinamool Congress on Friday wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking dismissal of Mehta. On Saturday, the TMC decided to approach President Ramnath Kovind, who appoints the solicitor general on the recommendation of cabinet committee of appointment, headed by the prime minister.
A solicitor general is the senior law officer of India but unlike an attorney general, his post is not a constitutional post. In certain sections, he is allowed to fight cases of other accused "which might serve the government's purpose".
"But for that, a permission of the government of India is needed," said a senior advocate of the Calcutta High Court.
However, a veteran Delhi-based editor said, "It is highly improper. The public prosecutor does not meet the accused he is prosecuting unless the IO (investigating officer) is present." Adhikari’s alleged meeting with Mehta was followed by a meeting with Union Home Minister Amit Shah and BJP president J.P. Nadda.
Mehta denied meeting Adhikari but did not deny that the latter had not come to his residence. The question remains if Adhikari visited the residence of the solicitor general to drop a message or put in any written request?
CBI sources have confirmed to THE WEEK that since Adhikari is one of the accused in the FIR, chance of him being prosecuted is high. While in the Narada case, the CBI has filed charge-sheets against four accused, including two cabinet ministers of Bengal, there are several others against whom charge-sheets are yet to be submitted in court. The four accused, though were arrested, were granted bail. The HC is now hearing the CBI’s plea to transfer the case out of a local court in Kolkata. Next hearing of the case is on July 16.
The prosecution is pending against others, including Adhikari, as the CBI is yet to get the nod of the Lok Sabha speaker. With the five-member bench of the Calcutta HC grilling CBI over the delay in investigation, during which the solicitor general had to face a barrage of questions, the CBI would have to justify its duties by charge-sheeting other accused including Adhikari.
Sources now do not rule out that Adhikari might become a state approver in the case. According to the CrPc, an accused could be turned an approver only when he is interrogated, prosecuted and charges are filed against him. Adhikari was interrogated but is yet to be fully prosecuted let alone charge-sheeted. Adhikari would either move the prosecutor or the agency with his request to turn state approver. A state approver can only give his submission to magistrate under 164 of the CrPc about the sequence of events of the criminal act. Before that he would be sent to a segregation cell for 48 hours.
BJP sources, however, have not confirmed this development. "When the solicitor general himself denied meeting him, so there cannot be any fuss about it. But so far, as cases are concerned, our government is determined to allow law to take its own course," said a national general secretary of the BJP.
