The supreme court today imposed a staggering Rs 10 lakh fine on Maharashtra government on a complaint that the then chief minister Vilasrao Deskmukh influenced police against registering an FIR against his brother.

A bench of justices G S Singhvi and A K Ganguly chided Deskmukh saying, "The (former) chief minister should not have interfered with the criminal justice system."

The apex court passed the order while dismissing the Maharashtra government's appeal challenging imposition of Rs 25,000 as fine on it earlier by the Nagpur bench of the Bombay high court on a petition by Buldhana district's farmers alleging that the police refused to register a criminal case against Deshmukh's brother Dilip Kumar under the Money Lending Act.

It was alleged that Deshmukh's personal secretary Amba Das had called up the then district superintendent of police (SP) to inform that the chief minister did not want any FIR to be registered in the case.

Accordingly, the SP asked his subordinates not to register any FIR but reportedly recorded the same in its file.

Aggrieved by the refusal of the police to register an FIR, the victims approached the Bombay high court which, apart from ordering registration of an FIR, also imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on the state.

Senior counsel U U Lalit and counsel Sanjay Karde appeared for the state of Maharashtra.