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High court to hear Jaya's petition afresh

A division bench of the Madras high court will hear afresh from Wednesday the batch of petitions filed by former Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalitha and her erstwhile cabinet colleagues, challenging the constitutional validity of appointing three special judges to try the corruption cases against them.

The bench, comprising Chief Justice M S Liberhan and Justice E Padmanabhan, would hear the arguments from the counsel for the petitioners on Wednesday.

It would listen to the arguments on behalf of the state and central governments on July 22, and reply by both parties on July 29.

On July 1, the bench, then comprising Justices Liberhan and K Govindarajan, had fixed a time-frame for hearing the cases afresh.

The need for a fresh hearing arose because of Justice D Raju's recent elevation as chief justice of the Himachal Pradesh high court. He, along with Justice Liberhan, had reserved orders on February 4 after hearing elaborate arguments. As the transfer had come before the judgment could be delivered, the cases were posted for fresh hearing.

Meanwhile, the state government has preferred an application for vacating the interim injunction granted by the high court on June 17, 1997, restraining the special judges from recording evidence in the corruption cases against Jayalalitha and others.

Senior counsel Rajiv Dhawan is likely to appear for Jayalalitha while K T S Tulsi would represent former All India Anna DMK minister Kannappan.

Special public prosecutor N Natarajan would appear for the government.

UNI

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