SC dismisses BJP MLAs’ plea against KJ George in Karnataka smart meter tender case

The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a plea by three Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislators seeking prosecution of Karnataka Energy minister KJ George over alleged irregularities in the allocation of a ₹4,985-crore smart electricity meter tender, upholding a Karnataka high court order that had quashed the case.

A bench of justices JB Pardiwala and K Vinod Chandran refused to entertain the appeal filed by three BJP legislators — CN Ashwathnarayan, SR Vishwanath and Dheeraj Muniraj — to revive their complaint before a Bengaluru court after the Karnataka high court quashed the case, finding no merit in the allegations in December 2025.

“Having heard the learned counsel appearing for the petitioners and having gone through the materials on record, we find no good ground to interfere with the impugned order passed by the high court. The Special Leave Petitions are accordingly dismissed,” the order, passed on Friday and uploaded on Saturday, said.

George was represented in the top court by senior advocate Kapil Sibal along with advocate Vivek Jain, who were not called upon to respond as the bench came to the conclusion after hearing senior advocate Lakshmy Iyenger for the petitioners and going through the case records.

The allegations pertained to 2024, when the petitioners, who are members of the Karnataka legislative assembly, alleged that the energy minister, who is also the chairman of Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Limited (BESCOM), acted in collusion with BESCOM officials to manipulate financial thresholds and circumvent statutory safeguards to award a tender for smart electricity meters to M/s Rajashree Electricals Pvt Ltd.

It was claimed that the tender, having a total project value of about ₹4,985 crore, was artificially projected on an “annual value” to reduce statutory requirements such as earnest money deposit and performance bank guarantee, which resulted in pecuniary advantage to the company that bagged the tender.

The petitioners initially approached the Lokayukta, which refused to direct an investigation, before filing a case before the trial court. In July 2025, the trial judge sought a report from the Lokayukta. Against this order, George and other accused approached the high court seeking quashing of the case.

The high court order of December 2, 2025, said that the allegations did not disclose any criminality and at best gave rise to a civil dispute. The high court further held the entire tender process to be transparent, with participation from multiple bidders and, more significantly, no allegation of any bribe being paid as quid pro quo.

The appeal filed by the three BJP MLAs in the top court said that the complaint pertained to large-scale irregularities, illegality and criminal misconduct in the formulation and execution of a smart meter tender, which could not be dismissed at the threshold without ordering an investigation.

By quashing the complaint at such a nascent stage, the high court foreclosed the possibility of any investigation into serious allegations involving public officials and a high-value public contract, causing grave miscarriage of justice, they added.