Lottery-utra nexus: Court rejects PIL for probe

GUWAHATI, Jan 23 — The Delhi High Court Tuesday dismissed a petition seeking probe into the alleged siphoning of huge amounts of Nagaland State lottery to the militant organisations active in the State in early nineties, saying the matter is beyond its jurisdiction, reports PTI. A division bench comprising Chief Justice SB Sinha and justice SK Sikri admitting the contention of senior advocate Sudhir Chandra, appearing for Nagaland, that the matter was beyond the jurisdiction of the Delhi High Court, dismissed a PIL filed by an NGO for CBI probe into the matter. The Court did not agree with the contention of Viraj Datar, counsel for NGO, Movement for National Awareness that the draws of the lottery used to be held in the national capital and therefore the matter was within its jurisdiction. CBI counsel Naveen Chawla told the Court that since the agency had not received any recommendation from the Nagaland Government to probe the case, “it cannot go ahead with the investigation as such a sanction by the concerned State is necessary under the Delhi Police Act, which applies to CBI.” While Datar alleged that the hundreds of crore rupees were siphoned out to militant organisation for several years when the lottery was being run some years ago he said the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in its report had pointed out various irregularities.