Mumbai, Dec. 17: Bombay High Court has dismissed the Maharashtra government’s plea to hand over the investigation into the stamp paper scam to the CBI.

Chief Justice C.K. Thakker and Justice Abhay Oka, giving reasons for the dismissal, said a special leave petition with a similar plea was pending before the Supreme Court.

Keeping in view the fast-paced probe launched by the special investigation team (SIT) — boasting of a spate of high-profile arrests, including that of former Mumbai police chief R.S. Sharma — the high court had kept in abeyance a similar appeal by the CBI and observed that the state police should continue with the probe.

The decision — a vindication of the SIT’s role in the probe — is a huge setback for the NDA government, which has been rooting for a central investigation. The Centre felt that it was beyond the state police’s “powers” to nail the politicians involved in the scam.

Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani had recently said the case should go to the CBI as it had become more than clear that the racket, allegedly masterminded by Abdul Karim Telgi, had ramifications of internal security and could have grave implications for the country’s economy.

The high court’s decision has set at rest the anxieties of a group of former Mumbai police commissioners and social activists that transferring the case to the CBI at this crucial juncture would scuttle, if not completely derail, the investigations.

Former top cops like D.S. Soman and Julio Ribeiro had gone to the extent of saying that they would move court against the state government’s decision to hand over the case to the CBI. “Look at the work they (the SIT officers) have been doing. I think they should go ahead with the probe and not be hindered. They are going in the right direction. It is there for everyone to see,’’ Soman, known for his integrity and no-nonsense attitude during his working days, said.

With a host of senior police officers in prison for their links with Telgi, there is ample indication that the probe may now shift focus and zero in on politicians. Antim Totla, a businessman close to deputy chief minister Chhagan Bhujbal’s nephew Samir, is being interrogated by a SIT team in Pune and is believed to have agreed to a lie-detector and truth serum test.

Samir’s name has cropped up time and again during investigations into the Rs 39,000-crore scam.

On Friday, Dilip Kamath, a police officer arrested for helping Telgi, wrote a letter from jail, alleging that both Bhujbal and Samir had links with the main accused.