HC asks Ishari K. Ganesh to produce order closing bribery case against him, ex-Minister

HC asks Ishari K. Ganesh to produce order closing bribery case against him, ex-Minister

The issue relates to a 2022 suo motu First Information Report of the DVAC regarding the corruption in issuing ‘essentiality certificate’ to Vels Medical College, which was under construction then. It also accused former Minister C. Vijayabaskar of inducing an inspection team to submit a false report

The court was also told that the DVAC had recommended only departmental action against the four government doctors who were part of the inspection team.

Mohamed Imranullah S.

CHENNAI. 06.07.2026

The Madras High Court has granted a final opportunity, till July 13, to educationist, film producer and actor Ishari K. Ganesh to produce an order passed either by the State government or the Vigilance Commission in 2024 accepting the decision of the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) to close a corruption case registered against him and former AIADMK Minister C. Vijayabaskar (now in the TVK) in 2022.

The First Division Bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G. Arul Murugan made it clear that Mr. Ganesh should produce within a week either the executive order accepting the DVAC’s closure report or a judicial order quashing the 2022 First Information Report (FIR) registered against him, failing which his present plea to quash an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) shall be dismissed.

P. Sidharthan, Special Public Prosecutor for the Directorate of Enforcement (ED), brought it to the notice of the court that the DVAC had registered the FIR against Dr. Vijayabaskar; Mr. Ganesh; the Dean of Vels Medical College and Hospital in Tiruvallur district, K. Srinivasaraja; and four government doctors, R. Balajinathan, T.M. Manohar, J. Sujatha, and J.A. Vasanthakumar, on September 12, 2022.

The FIR was booked suo motu on the basis of intelligence collected by the DVAC that Mr. Ganesh of Vels Institute of Science, Technology and Advanced Studies (VISTAS), a deemed-to-be university, had in 2020 allegedly bribed the then Health Minister, Dr. Vijayabaskar, to obtain ‘essentiality certificate’ for the newly constructed Vels Medical College so that it could begin admitting 150 students to the MBBS course.

Under the Minimum Requirements for Annual M.B.B.S Admissions Regulations, 2020, the ‘essentiality certificate’ could be issued only if a private hospital had been in existence for a minimum of two years and was capable of being developed into a teaching hospital with a fully functional capacity of 300 beds. However, Vels Medical College was issued an ‘essentiality certificate’ even when its buildings were under construction, the FIR read.

It also accused Dr. Vijayabaskar of having induced the inspection team, comprising four doctors from the Government Mohan Kumaramangalam Medical College Hospital, to submit a false report. “The field verification report of the Assistant Director of Town and Country Planning, Tiruvallur, dated June 11, 2020, for building approval clearly proves that the buildings were under construction during the said period,” the FIR added.

However, when one of the accused, Dr. Balajinathan, filed a petition in the High Court in 2025 to quash the FIR only with respect to the charges levelled against him, the DVAC filed a counter-affidavit stating that it had closed the case against Dr. Vijayabaskar, Mr. Ganesh and Dr. Srinivasaraja since no incriminating evidence could be collected against the three individuals during the course of investigation.

DVAC report

The counter-affidavit also stated that the Vigilance Commission had accepted the report submitted by the DVAC to drop action against all the accused and forwarded it to the Public Department for passing orders. Further, the Vigilance Commission itself had issued an order on June 25, 2024, dropping action against Mr. Ganesh and Dr. Srinivasaraja since they were private individuals and not public servants.

The court was also told that the DVAC had recommended only departmental action against the four government doctors for the alleged lapses on their part during the inspection of the medical college. After recording the submissions, Justice Shamim Ahmed had on January 30, 2025 quashed all further proceedings initiated pursuant to the registration of the FIR against Dr. Balajinathan.

Relying upon that order, Mr. Ganesh had filed the present writ petition for quashing the ECIR registered against him by the ED, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act of 2002, on March 23, 2023. The ECIR had been booked based on the FIR registered by the DVAC under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. Since the FIR had been closed, the ECIR should also be declared illegal, he contended.

However, when the Chief Justice’s Bench insisted upon production of either an executive order or a judicial order on the closure of the predicate offence, the petitioner had been seeking time periodically since March 18, 2026. Hence, the judges on Friday granted him a final opportunity and warned that his plea to quash the ECIR would be dismissed if no such order was produced by July 13.