Guwahati: Gauhati High Court on Thursday ordered a preliminary inquiry by the CBI into allegations of corruption against former Arunachal Pradesh chief minister Nabam Tuki.

"The order was passed by a bench of Chief Justice Ajit Singh and Justice Manojit Bhuyan in writ petition (civil) number 1267/2010," CBI counsel Subhash Chandra Kayal said.

The allegations against Tuki are related to granting of contracts to his relatives without inviting tenders.

When Tuki was the minister of public works department and urban development, he allegedly abused his official position as minister by awarding contracts to his wife Nabam Yani, sister-in-law, brother and other relatives by flouting norms and procedures in 2005-06.

In the same case, the high court had ordered a CBI probe against Tuki on August 21, 2015, which he challenged in the Supreme Court on the ground that he was not given a proper hearing.

Lawyers for Tuki had submitted before the apex court that without hearing lawyers for any of the parties, then acting Chief Justice of the high court K. Sreedhar Rao and Justice P.K. Saikia directed the CBI to take over the documents from the court and file the FIR and submit the report to the special judge in Guwahati.

The Supreme Court on February 6 this year set aside the 2015 high court judgment and referred the matter back to the high court for a fresh hearing.

After giving proper hearing to the parties concerned, the high court on Thursday directed the CBI to conduct a preliminary inquiry into the allegations against Tuki.

"Since the state government has defended the awarding of contracts in question, we are of the view that the state police will not be in a position to investigate the allegations fairly, more particularly, when a former minister and high officials are involved," the high court order said.

"The allegations are very serious in nature and require a thorough probe by an independent agency," it said. The high court asked the CBI director to depute an officer to collect the records pertaining to this case from the registrar-general of the high court.

Originally a PIL was filed by Nabam Tagam in the high court in 2006 seeking a CBI probe against Tuki for illegally awarding contracts to his relatives. Tagam later made a request for withdrawal of the PIL but the high court on February 16, 2010 rejected his prayer with fine of Rs 10,000 and registered the PIL as a suo motu writ petition.