New Delhi:
The Supreme Court today declined to stay the disproportionate assets case against former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister Jayalalithaa pending in a Karnataka court.
A bench of justices Dalveer Bhandari and Deepak Verma refused to stay the trial, which is scheduled to commence from tomorrow, after senior counsel Nageswar Rao, appearing for the former Chief Minister, contended that the case cannot be allowed to proceed without rectifying errors in the translated documents.
The apex court permitted translators to assist the court in translating the original documents.
Jayalalithaa had contended that the documents had been translated from Tamil to English in a distorted manner to falsely implicate her.
The documents have been translated from Tamil to English as the case had been transferred out of the state.
She claimed if the errors were not rectified, it would result in miscarriage of justice.
Besides Jayalalithaa, the other accused in the case are Sasikala, V.N. Sudhagaran, Ialavarasi and T.T.V. Dinakaran.
In her special leave petition challenging the Karnataka High Court order dated November 24 allowing the trial to proceed, Jayalalithaa said she and others are being prosecuted on the basis of translation of depositions of witnesses which were originally recorded in Tamil when the case was pending in Chennai, Tamil Nadu."
She claimed the quality of translation was very poor and the translation of evidence from Tamil to English was done very carelessly.
The translation was distorted and did not reflect the true evidence recorded in Tamil, Jayalalithaa claimed.
According to her, at many places, the evidence which was not available in Tamil was introduced in the garb of translation clearly to implicate her, in that there was no incriminating evidence against her in the Tamil deposition, but in the English translation of the evidence, incriminating evidence had been "maliciously inserted."
She contended if the errors were not rectified, it would lead to flagrant violation of her fundamental right to a free and fair trial.