Mumbai: The Bombay High Court on Tuesday refused to restrain a trial court from framing charges against Lt Col Shrikant Purohit and other accused persons in the 2008 Malegaon blast case.
A bench of justices S S Shinde and Mridula Bhatkar, however, directed the trial court - the special National Investigating Agency (NIA) court here - to consider, under a previous Supreme Court order, the issue of 'sanction' of prosecution raised by Purohit.
The special court is expected to begin framing of charges in the case Wednesday. Purohit had approached the high court earlier this month.
In his plea filed through advocate Shrikant Shivade, he had urged the high court to stay the framing of charges until the issue of his sanction, raised by him in his appeal seeking a discharge, was decided upon finally by the high court.
In his appeal as well as in the plea that was heard Tuesday, Purohit claimed that he could not be prosecuted in the case since the sanction granted by the government to prosecute him in the case was wrong in law.
A prior sanction for Purohit's prosecution was required since he was a serving Army officer at the time.
The sanction was issued on January 17, 2009, by the additional chief secretary of the Maharashtra Home department.
Advocate Shivade, however, said under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), the state law and judiciary department, which is the sanctioning authority, has to set up an appropriate authority and seek its report first.
Last year, Purohit had also filed a plea in the high court challenging his prosecution on the ground of validity of the state's sanction.
However, the high court had on December 18 last year refused to quash the government sanction.