New Delhi, Apr 27 (PTI): The Tamil Nadu government has no right to appoint advocate Bhawani Singh as special public prosecutor to appear in the Karnataka High Court for former chief minister J. Jayalalithaa's corruption case, the Supreme Court held on Monday.

However, a three-judge bench of Justices Dipak Misra, R.K. Agarwal and Prafulla C. Pant said that appointment of Bhawani Singh is “bad in law”, but it does not warrant fresh hearing of appeals of the convicts, including Jayalalithaa, chief of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK).

“Tamil Nadu has no authority to appoint respondent number 4 (Singh) as Special Public Prosecutor,” the bench said.

Last September, Jayalalithaa, her aide Sasikala and two of her relatives had been sentenced to four years in jail by a special court in a corruption case that dragged on for 18 years. In October, the Supreme Court had granted conditional bail to Jayalalithaa.

The bench said it does not concur with the findings of Justice Madan B. Lokur that fresh hearing on the appeal be conducted before the high court.

It also DMK leader K. Anbazhagan and Karnataka to file written submissions in the high court by Tuesday. Anbazhagan had petitioned the court to have Singh removed as special public prosecutor in the case.

The bench said that high court may go ahead and pronounce the verdict after considering the submissions of Anbazhagan and the state in the matter.

Dealing with the legal provisions on the appointment of the special public prosecutor, the bench said Singh's appointment was meant only for the trial in lower court.

On April 22, the apex court had reserved its judgment on the issue of legality of appointment of Singh as SPP and noted that his appointment prima facie appeared to suffer from irregularities but it will not allow a fresh hearing before the high court.

The matter was referred to the larger bench on April 15, when a bench of justices Madan B. Lokur and R. Banumathi had delivered a split verdict.

Justice Lokur, heading the two-judge bench, had allowed the plea of Anbazhagan and ordered a fresh hearing on the AIADMK chief's plea against her conviction, saying the appeal proceedings conducted so far have been “vitiated”.

But Justice R. Banumathi held that the SPP was duly authorised to represent the state before the Karnataka High Court.

On April 17, the apex court had extended the bail of Jayalalithaa, which was to expire on April 18, till the disposal of her appeal in the Karnataka High Court.

The court had also granted the high court time till May 12 to decide the AIADMK chief's appeal, which will be subject to a decision by a three-judge bench of the apex court.