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The Supreme Court, on Monday, August 11, refused to delete any adverse remarks made against former Tamil Nadu Minister V Senthil Balaji in the judgements related to the cash-for-jobs scam case. The apex court made it clear that it would “not touch a single word” of the earlier orders.
According to Live Law, a Bench of Justices Surya Kant and Joymalya Bagchi stated, “We will not expunge anything, we will not touch a single word… We are not touching the judgement. We will only clarify that the observations shall have no bearing on the trial. That’s a basic principle of criminal jurisprudence… there’s no question of entertaining any review.”
Senthil Balaji had filed three miscellaneous applications seeking the removal of certain remarks in separate judgments, including the Supreme Court’s September 2022 ruling restoring criminal complaints against him, its May 2023 order permitting the Enforcement Directorate (ED) probe, and a subsequent order rejecting his bail cancellation plea in the money laundering case. However, Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, representing Balaji, chose not to press for expunction and instead sought a clarification that the observations should not influence the trial court.
The bench accepted this limited plea, recording that the observations in earlier judgements “shall have no bearing on the pending trial.” It also issued the same caveat the Court had used in similar past cases.
Justice Surya Kant also cautioned against the practice of filing modification applications after the retirement of judges who authored the original verdicts, calling it “as bad as forum shopping” and noting that such pleas could be dismissed on this ground alone.
The applications were linked to long-running criminal proceedings in which Senthil Balaji is accused of taking bribes from job aspirants during his tenure as Transport Minister between 2011 and 2015, allegedly promising appointments in the Metro Transport Corporation. Multiple FIRs were filed in 2018, and the cases have since seen several rounds of litigation.
In September 2022, the Supreme Court set aside a Madras High Court order quashing the complaints on the basis of settlements, holding that “serious offences like corruption cannot be quashed merely on the basis of an offer to refund” and that there was evidence of corrupt recruitment practices.
Senthil Balaji, arrested by the ED in June 2023 in a related money laundering probe, was granted bail by the top court in September 2024. In April 2025, the Court refused to cancel his bail but warned he must choose between ministerial office and liberty, prompting his resignation from the Tamil Nadu Cabinet.