Nagam Janardhan Reddy vs The State Of Telangana

2025 INSC 798 NON-REPORTABLE IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA

CIVIL APPELLATE JURISDICTION

SPECIAL LEAVE PETITION (CIVIL) NO.7005 OF 2019

NAGAM JANARDHAN REDDY PETITIONER

VERSUS

STATE OF TELANGANA & OTHERS RESPONDENTS

ORDER

The petitioner herein had filed Writ Petition (PIL) No.338 of

2017 before the High Court of Judicature at Hyderabad for the

State of Telangana and the State of Andhra Pradesh, seeking the

following reliefs:

“It is respectfully prayed that this Hon’ble Court, in the interests of justice, be pleased to issue a Writ, Order or Direction, more particularly one in the nature of Writ of Mandamus declaring the action of respondents 1 to 7 in fraudulently revising the value of Electro Mechanical (E&M) Equipments for Palamuru Ranga Reddy Lift Irrigation Scheme for package 1, 5, 8 and 16 from Rs.5960.79 crores as estimated by Engineering Staff College of India to Rs.8386.86 crores by the Advisor and the Departmental Committee thereby causing loss of sum Signature Not Verified of Rs.2426.07 crores to the public exchequer and not Digitally signed by babita pandey taking any action on the representation made by the petitioner dated 11.01.2017, 29.07.2017 and 29.09.2017 Date: 2025.06.03 13:01:33 IST Reason:

Page 1 of 10 as illegal, unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious and consequently set aside all consequential actions of the respondents relating to PRRLIS for packages 1,5,8 and 16 and further direct respondent no.10 to conduct an investigation into the above and submit report to this Hon’ble Court and pass such other order or orders as this Hon’ble Court may deem fit and proper in the interest of justice.”

2. The said writ petition is said to have been filed in public

interest.

3. The petitioner was elected as a Member of the Legislative

Assembly of Nagar Kurnool Assembly Constituency six times and

has held Ministerial positions in the erstwhile State of Andhra

Pradesh for nearly a decade and he has also been the Deputy Leader

of Opposition and Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee

(PAC) from 2009-2011.

4. The Public Interest Litigation was filed by the petitioner herein

being aggrieved by the manner in which the estimates prepared for

various works including for Electro Mechanical (E&M) equipments,

in Palamuru Ranga Reddy Lift Irrigation Scheme (PRRLIS) were

revised by not adhering to the public trust reposed in the

authorities, thereby resulting in loss of sum of Rs.2426.07 crores to

the public exchequer.

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5. The Writ Petition was heard by the Division Bench of the High

Court and was dismissed by the impugned order dated 03.12.2018.

Hence, this Special Leave Petition.

6. We have heard Shri Prashant Bhushan, learned counsel for

the petitioner and learned senior counsel appearing for respondent

no.1/State and learned counsel and learned senior counsel

appearing for the respective respondents and perused the material

on record.

7. During the course of submissions, learned counsel for the

petitioner drew our attention to the prayer(s) sought for by the

petitioner in the writ petition filed before the High Court. The

prayers have been extracted above.

8. We note that a two-fold prayer was sought by the petitioner in

the writ petition. The first was to issue a Writ in the nature of

mandamus declaring the action of respondent nos. 1 to 7 revising

the value of Electro Mechanical (E&M) Equipments for PRRLIS for

packages 1, 5, 8 and 16 from Rs.5960.79 crores, as estimated by

Engineering Staff College of India, to Rs.8386.86 crores by the

Page 3 of 10 Advisor and the Departmental Committee, as fraudulent and bad in

law. As a result, according to the petitioner, there is a loss of

Rs.2426.07 crores to the public exchequer.

9. The second prayer sought for by the petitioner herein was that

there ought to be an investigation conducted by respondent

no.10/Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) into the illegal,

unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious actions of the official

respondents relating to PRRLIS for packages 1, 5, 8 and 16 and the

report of the CBI ought to be submitted to the High Court for further

orders.

10. The High Court has considered the aforesaid two prayers and

has ultimately dismissed the writ petition.

11. Learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that the High

Court ought not to have summarily dismissed the writ petition.

Instead, it ought to have gone into the records and considered either

referring the matter for investigation to the CBI, or alternatively,

devised the procedure by which the truth could have been

unraveled, in which event, the fraud in the estimates made as

Page 4 of 10 aforesaid would have emerged and consequent actions could have

been taken. It was further submitted that the High Court has

considered the contentions of the petitioner summarily without

going into the depth of the matter and has simply dismissed the writ

petition.

12. The further contention of learned counsel for the petitioner

Shri Prashant Bhushan was that the relevant documents, papers

and records may be perused which would clearly indicate that there

is a fraud committed in revising the estimates causing a grave loss

to the State exchequer. He therefore urged this Court to have a

detailed hearing of this matter so that the prayers sought for by the

petitioner herein could be granted. In this regard, our attention was

also drawn to order dated 18.12.2024 passed by this Court in the

present SLP.

13. Per contra, learned senior counsel appearing for respondent

no.13/Project Proponent contended that the High Court was right

in dismissing the writ petition filed by the petitioner herein, not only

for the reasons which have been discussed in the impugned order

but also for the fact that the very maintainability of the writ petition

Page 5 of 10 is a serious issue. In this regard, our attention was drawn to a chart

submitted during the course of submissions to contend that earlier

PIL Nos.28/2016, 179/2016 and 338/2017 were filed by the very

same petitioner, which were disposed of taking into consideration

the very same contentions raised by the petitioner at various stages

of the very same project and therefore, long after the commencement

of the project and portion of it having been completed at a belated

stage, the writ petition in the present case was filed, which has been

nevertheless considered and the contention has been answered by

the High Court. Therefore, this Court may not consider the prayers

sought for by the petitioner herein at this point of time. In support

of this contention, our attention was also drawn to an earlier order

dated 25.08.2022 passed by this Court wherein the objections

raised by respondent nos.1 to 7 as preliminary objections relating

to the maintainability of the present Special Leave Petition was also

drawn. In that order, this Court has recorded that the writ petition

filed by the petitioner before the High Court was firstly barred by the

principle of constructive res judicata and secondly, there was

suppression of material facts in the synopsis filed in the present

petition and therefore this Special Leave Petition ought to be heard

Page 6 of 10 on the preliminary objection before the matter is considered on

merits.

14. It was further submitted that insofar as this very project is

concerned, the Central Vigilance Commission has submitted its

report. In this regard, our attention was also drawn to an Office

Memorandum issued by the Director, Office of the Central Vigilance

Commission dated 12.09.2017 to the effect that the complaint

regarding contract of PRRLIS packages 5 and 8 worth Rs.8153

crores, was a false complaint and was not at all substantiated. This

was on examination of the said complaint by the Commission.

15. Therefore, it was submitted that this Court may not pursue

this matter any longer having regard to the aforesaid contentions.

16. By way of response to these contentions, learned counsel for

the petitioner urged that there has been a grave fraud in the revision

of the values of Electro Mechanical (E&M) Equipments in respect of

PRRLIS for packages 1, 5, 8 and 16 and this is a fit case where the

High Court ought to have exercised its jurisdiction and at least

considered the second prayer made by the petitioner herein by

Page 7 of 10 referring the matter to the CBI for the purpose of conducting an

investigation and submitting a report as the State exchequer has

been put to jeopardy on account of fraudulent revision in the

estimate of the project.

17. We have considered the submissions advanced at the Bar.

Primarily, we are on the question as to whether the High Court was

justified in dismissing the writ petition having answered certain

contentions raised by the petitioner herein as to whether the High

Court ought to have exercised its discretion in granting the prayer(s)

made by the petitioner herein.

18. We have extracted the prayers sought for by the petitioner

herein. As far as the first prayer is concerned, it is for a declaration

that the action of respondent nos.1 to 7 was fraudulent in revising

the estimates of the project in question. We find that those are

aspects which would call for determination of facts or in other

words, a factual adjudication which cannot be done in a writ petition

filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India.

Page 8 of 10

19. Insofar as the second prayer for referring the matter to the CBI

is concerned, we find that the High Court on considering the

contentions raised by the petitioner herein has given its answer to

the same and has declined to exercise its discretion to refer the

matter to the CBI for the purpose of conducting an investigation and

to submit a report to the Court. We find that the High Court was

justified in not exercising its discretion and jurisdiction to refer the

matter to the CBI. We do not think that in this Special Leave

Petition, we can sit in judgment over the non-exercise of discretion

in favour of the petitioner herein and consequently granting the

prayer of the petitioner for referring the matter to the CBI for the

conduct of an investigation.

20. In the circumstances, we do not find any reason to interfere

with the impugned order.

21. Before parting with this matter, we would also like to record

the fact that the petitioner has been pursuing the matter right from

the time of issuance of the tender to the project proponent and

BHEL. Writ Petition (PIL) No.81/2016 is pending consideration

whereas the other petitions have been concluded, against which

Page 9 of 10 there have been no further challenge before this Court and it is

stated that only a review petition has been filed with regard to PIL

No.28/2016. We would also like to record the fact that the Central

Vigilance Commission by its order dated 12.09.2017, on

examination of the complaint made by the very petitioner herein,

has stated that it was unsubstantiated and had decided to put the

matter to rest.

22. In the circumstances, we are not inclined to consider this

Special Leave Petition any further. Hence, the same is dismissed.

Pending application(s) including the application for

intervention/impleadment shall stand disposed of.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . J.

(B.V. NAGARATHNA)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . J.

(SATISH CHANDRA SHARMA)

NEW DELHI;

MAY 21, 2025

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