Tuesday, March 02, 2010

House panel lets Sampangi off bribery hook

The seven-member committee headed by former deputy Speaker K G Bopaiah (now Speaker) in his report tabled in the legislative assembly on Monday recommended the government “severely rap and pass strictures’’ against complainant Husain Muheen Farooq for bringing a “false” case, for “defaming” the MLA and also failing to appear before it despite being served three notices to substantiate his charges.

Given the absence of evidence, the committee couldn’t decide whether Sampangi committed any act of indiscipline or misused his office as legislator. The committee quoted M N Kaul and S L Shakdher — ‘Practice and Procedure of Parliament’ — while passing punishing orders on Farooq under “disobedience of the order of the committee’’ and “contempt of court’’. During the inquiry, the committee said Farooq was not available at his address and his office had been closed for the past five months.

The committee also suggested setting up a permanent committee to probe such issues by framing guidelines for its functioning. Following a complaint by Farooq, Lokayukta sleuths in January 2009 trapped Sampangi while accepting a bribe of Rs 5 lakh (Rs 50,000 in cash and Rs 4.5 lakh in cheque) from a complainant in the Legislators’ Home to settle a civil dispute over ownership of a site in KGF.

Source : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bangalore/House-panel-lets-Sampangi-off-bribery-hook/articleshow/5631711.cms

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