According to the Supreme Court website, the special bench, which will be sitting at the time when the apex court is closed for the Dussehra holidays, is scheduled to consider the petitions filed by Pinarayi Vijayan and his kin against the high court order dismissing their pleas to file appeals against a single judge's direction to lodge an FIR against them in the alleged Cochin Minerals and Rutile Limited (CMRL) bribery case.

On October 15, the Kerala High Court rejected the applications of Vijayan, his daughter Veena T and her husband P A Mohammed Riyas to file an appeal against the single judge's October 9 order, while holding that "an accused in a corruption case has no legal right to be heard before registering the FIR."

Vijayan, Veena and Riyas, in their appeals before the high court, had claimed that they were not heard by the single judge before issuing the October 9 direction to lodge the FIR.

They further claimed before the high court that the petition, in which the single judge passed the October 9 order, was in the form of a public interest litigation (PIL) and therefore, it should have been heard by a division bench which deals with PILs.

The appeals before the high court were moved in the wake of the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau's (VACB) Special Investigation Unit-1 registering two FIRs against Vijayan and his family members in connection with the alleged CMRL bribery case.

The Kerala High Court on October 9 directed the VACB to register a case based on a report submitted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to the state police.

The ED had sought registration of a case based on evidence gathered during its investigation and searches conducted under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

The agency has alleged that CMRL made fraudulent payments of Rs 2.78 crore to Veena's now-defunct company, Exalogic Solutions, under the guise of IT consultancy services. (PTI)