New Delhi, March 7
Five Congress MLAs belonging to the Captain Amarinder Singh camp today moved a petition in the Supreme Court for transfer of the corruption case against Punjab Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and his son Sukhbir Singh out of the state claiming that a “free and fair” trial in the present circumstances was not possible there.

The joint petition was filed by Jeet Mohinder Singh, Sukhpal Singh Khera, Gurpreet Singh, Randeep Singh Nabha and Mangat Ram Bansal. It is reliably learnt that Amarinder Singh himself is planning to file an independent petition for transfer of the case from the Ropar special court to outside Punjab probably by tomorrow.

“The petition is ready and was to be filed today but due to paucity of time, it could not be moved in the Court Registry before it closed for the day. Now, it will be filed tomorrow,” Amarinder’s lawyer told The Tribune.

The five MLAs have sought to apply the same parameters in the Badal case as were applied by the court in former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa’s case transferring the trial against her in a disproportionate assets case to Bangalore.

They said under the present SAD-BJP government when Badal and his son Sukhbir were “wielding” power, “the trial has been reduced to a farce”. All norms of fair trial under the Constitution “are being thrown to the winds and trampled under the feet of powerful politicians - Parkash Singh Badal, his son Sukhbir Singh Badal and other known associates,” said the petition annexed with voluminous supporting documents from the trial court.

The Congress leaders also have raised the issue of replacing special public prosecutor A.P.S. Deol by Pradeep Mehta, a close “confidant” of Badal after he took over as Chief Minister. They accused Mehta of “deliberately avoiding filing replies and objections to crucial applications presented by the accused persons.”

This, they claimed, was being done to let the trial “slide in favour of the accused persons on a daily basis.” This was a serious case relating to alleged acts of “corruption, amassing of black money and ‘benami’ properties” against all powerful politicians and could not be treated as any other normal case, the Congress MLAs said.

They have also listed details about how many witnesses have turned hostile so far under “political pressure”, particularly the police officials, who had probed the case and other government officials, who were crucial witnesses.

The petition has highlighted how Surinder Pal, SSP, who was the head of the investigating team had “resiled” his own statement in the trial court on various crucial aspects of the investigation and had put the entire blame on his senior B.K. Uppa, a DIG-rank officer.