IAS officer

DK Ravi

advocate Sajan Poovayya

CID

IAS officer's husband was with her when Ravi called. Hardly 4 calls, he claims in courtThe case filed by the husband of the woman, whose name has been embroiled in the case of’s death, seeking privacy from publication of their names in relation to the investigation has been adjourned till Thursday.The petitioner’swas asked to submit written counter objections to the arguments by the government.However, the brief arguments in the case on Tuesday were not without drama.During the argument, the petitioner’s advocate said the state government’shad spread the wrong information and media reports were quoting police officers.Giving an example of the report that 44 calls were allegedly made by DK Ravi to the woman IAs officer, the advocate said, ““The reports said 44 calls were made in the last one hour. There were not even four calls. I (husband) was with her.”This statement was made when he was arguing against the government's plea to vacate the interim order passed on Sunday by the court which prevented chief minister Siddaramaiah from revealing the status report of the Ravi death investigation in the Assembly.Later during the argument, the court said the government’s application for vacation of the interim order would be decided once the petitioner filed the counter objections.Additional advocate general Ponnanna countered this by saying there was urgency and cited the fact that the interim order was passed on a Sunday. “Why is Sunday being made an issue? I have the rights,” senior advocate Poovayya intervened.To this, Ponnanna said, “If they have urgency, we too have urgency. It is being projected as if the Assembly would have discussed not the issue but the petitioner's wife. That is not the case.” Tempers were raised as Poovayya intervened and said that it was not for the executive or CID to decide what was the truth. He said that on Monday, the government in its objections had mentioned that the petitioner's wife and DK Ravi enjoyed “more than a cordial relationship” and said government was making such statements in court as if the case was decided.“The legality of the relationship should be decided by the court after the trial and not by the CID or the executive,” he said.Earlier, the additional advocate general had made a strong argument for the interim order issued by the court on Sunday to be vacated.He then requested the court to transfer the documents submitted by the government in a sealed cover on Monday to the CBI. Since the case has been transferred to the CBI, he wanted the documents which are details of the investigation by the state CID to be given to the CBI.Poovayya objected to this, saying the documents were photocopies or printouts and secondary in nature and the government was trying to make it look like the court was handing the papers to the CBI.Poovayya said that the government can make an application for taking back the sealed covers and then giving it to the CBI themselves rather than use their case for the purpose.The court said that since CBI was not a party in the case nor a necessary party, there was no need for the court to give them the documents. It said that if CBI requires them, it can make an application to the court.The court said that the case has become academic and the petitioner’s object has been served. Poovayya said that only one of his objects, that of preventing the tabling of the details in the house, was served but the other object of his petition was to get back the information that the government's CID has already released in the public domain.The government has to prevent further publication, he said. Poovayya then told the court about the alleged 44 calls and said also disagreed with the court's observation that the interim order had become infructuous. “The information collected till now cannot be published by the executive. If the case has been handed over to the CBI, the government has nothing to do with the information collected so far,” Poovayya said. The court said that a different agency would be conducting the inquiry and its order restraining the CID and police from publishing details would not hold.On the other hand, the government too wanted the interim order vacated or modified to state that the CM was not prevented from making a statement in the Assembly.