Shimla . The Himachal Pradesh High Court on Monday expressed displeasure that the CBI has not filed a single charge sheet in the case of wrong and illegal payment and misappropriation under the Centre-funded post-matriculation scholarship scheme, despite a lapse of six months. Earlier in the day, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) presented its seventh status report in the High Court. According to the report, the involvement of 28 out of 1,176 institutions and 266 private institutions was found in the investigation of the alleged scam.
The CBI counsel said that the investigation against the 17 institutions is still on. On this, the court expressed displeasure and said that a similar situation had come to the fore when the matter was listed for hearing on October 20, 2021. Even after a lapse of six months, not a single charge sheet has been filed.
The counsel tried to justify this position by arguing that the CBI has recorded the statements of 214 witnesses, but the court was not satisfied with such justification for not completing the investigation within six months.
A division bench of Chief Justice Mohammad Rafiq and Justice Jyotsna Rewal Dua passed the order on a writ petition by Shyam Lal of Bilaspur district.
The petitioner said that Shakti Bhushan, who was appointed by the state government to investigate misappropriation of financial scholarship, filed a first information report in 2018 and the inquiry report revealed that huge amount of scholarship was misused. Apart from the educational institutions within the state, several other educational institutions located in other states were also involved in the scam.
Meanwhile, the bench gave another opportunity to the CBI to expedite the investigation and file the charge sheet before the competent court.
Also, it directed the CBI to file a fresh status report on the next date of hearing on April 20.
—AnyTV News
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