While Justice M Sathyanarayanan directed DVAC to register an FIR against the Minister, Justice R Hemalatha, the other judge on the bench, differed with the view on the basis that she did not find any prima facie evidence warranting registration of an FIR against the Minister.

“Any further action in this case would not serve any useful purpose and it would be only like flogging a dead horse,” she said while dismissing the PIL.

In view of the dissenting order, Justice Sathyanarayanan forwarded the PIL to Chief Justice for appropriate orders.

In the PIL, pending for the past seven years, the DVAC had informed the court that there was no prima facie material in the complaint against the Minister and hence investigation against the said Minister had been dropped.

The bench then wondered as to whether a 754-page report submitted by the DVAC could be termed as the outcome of a preliminary inquiry whose object was only to find out whether any cognizable offence had been made out in the complaint or not.

It also observed as to how the DVAC could expect the High Court to drop all proceedings on the basis of an exhaustive investigation conducted without even registering a FIR in the guise of conducting a preliminary inquiry. The bench had also then sought to know as to how the DVAC could give a clean chit to the Minister who was found to be in possession of assets disproportionate to his income though the unaccounted amount was less than 10 per cent.