On Tuesday, JD(S) and BJP started the process for removal of the Karnataka Lokayukta Y Bhaskar Rao over corruption charges that he is facing along with his son, Ashwin Rao.
Forty-two JD(S) and BJP MLCs and 83 MLAs of both parties have signed a petition, seeking removal of Bhaskar Rao and enquiry into the corruption allegations. It was submitted before the Chairman of the Legislative Council and the Speaker of the Legislative Assembly on November 17.
Now it is upon the Speaker to give the petition to the Chief Justice of the Karnataka high Court, who in turn will have to conduct an enquiry within three months. If the Chief Justice finds there is cause for removal, the assembly then can ask the Governor to remove the Lokayukta.
Karnataka government had amended Section 6 of the Lokayukta Act, some time back, to allow for the former judge to be removed from office. Siddaramaiah government specifically amended the law to deal with Bhaskar Rao’s case.
So far it was thought that only his son Ashwin Rao was the involved in the Lokayukta scam, however, Kannada news channel Suvarna revealed that a call was made from his office itself in connection with a deal, which amounts to Lokayukta Bhaskar Rao himself being involved in corruption scandal.
The news channel has been claiming that they had given the audio clipping to the police for investigation.
Since the corruption racket came to light in July 2015, Bhaskar Rao has been on extended leave. On October 21, he extended his leave for the fourth time, but has refused to step down despite numerous public campaigns. Every year Lokayukta, at any time avail 70 days leave with full allowances and 90 days with half allowance.
The case against Ashwin Rao was filed in May 2015 by a government executive engineer, M N Krishnamurthy, who alleged that Rao demanded Rs 1 crore to stop the initiation of corruption proceedings against him.
A few days later when Krishnamurthy took the matter to Lokayukta SP Sonia Narang , she submitted a preliminary report to Lokayukta Registrar and ADGP (Lokayukta) police instead of filing an FIR. Bhaskar Rao allegedly buried the preliminary report when it was brought to his notice.