Kalburgi murder case: ‘You have done nothing,’ SC rebukes Karnakata government for lax inquiry
The bench gave the government two weeks’ time to file a progress report on the investigation.
The Supreme Court on Monday rebuked the Karnataka government for “doing nothing and just fooling around” in the investigation into the murder of Kannada writer MM Kalburgi, PTI reported. The rationalist was killed in Dharwad in Karnataka in August 2015.
A bench of Justices RF Nariman and Navin Sinha was hearing a petition filed by the writer’s wife Uma Devi Kalburgi. The court gave the Karnataka government two weeks to filed a progress report on the investigation.
The bench said it may consider transferring the petition to the Bombay High Court, “where a similar matter is pending”. The Bombay High Court is monitoring the investigations into the murders of Professor Narendra Dhabolkar, who was shot dead in 2013, and the rationalist Govind Pansare, who was killed in Kolhapur in February 2015.
“What have you [Karnataka government] done so far? Nothing. You are just fooling around,” the court said.
MM Kalburgi: Supreme Court gives two weeks time to Karnataka government to submit progress report in the investigation. The Court also expressed its inclination to transfer the petitions in this case to Bombay HC on account of Karnataka's laxity in the probe.
— Bar & Bench (@barandbench) November 26, 2018
The Karnataka Police’s Criminal Investigation Department is investigating Kalburgi’s killing. A forensic report submitted by the investigators to a Bengaluru court earlier had said the same gun was used to kill Kalburgi and journalist Gauri Lankesh.
In January, citing “inaction” by the current investigators, Kalburgi’s wife had sought an inquiry by a Special Investigation Team.
On March 23, the Centre had told the Supreme Court that it did not want to hand over the inquiry to the National Investigation Agency as the crime was not a “scheduled offence” under the NIA Act. The Centre’s statement was in response to Uma Devi Kalburgi’s petition.
She had submitted that no agency had carried out a substantial investigation into the case and claimed that the murders of Kalburgi and Dabholkar followed similar patterns.