The Supreme Court today dismissed former Kerala Power minister R Balakrishnan Pillai and another official P.K. Sajeev's petitions seeking bail and review of its judgement awarding one year rigorous imprisonment in the Idamalayar dam corruption case. A bench of justices P Sathasivam and B S Chauhan also dismissed their application for hearing of the review petition in an open court instead of the usual practice of it being decided in the judges' chambers. The apex court, however, posted for Thursday hearing of the review petition made by another convicted official Ramabhadran Nair. The bench on February 10 had convicted the former minister and two others while reversing the acquittal order passed by the Kerala High Court. The apex court had earlier upheld the prosecution plea that the former minister has entered into a criminal conspiracy that caused a loss of over 2 crore rupees to the Kerala State Electricity Board by awarding contracts for construction of a power tunnel and surge shaft of the Idamalayar hydro electricity power project to contractor Paulose, now deceased at extra ordinarily high rates. The apex court, upholding the appeal filed by the then Leader of the Opposition and present Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan, said the High Court had committed a grave error by overlooking the clinching evidence marshalled by the prosecution and the conviction rightly awarded by the special court in Kerala. The apex court also expressed concern that cases of corruption relating to political personalities have been dragging endlessly in the country and pointed that in the present case, though the scandal took place in 1982, the prosecution was launched only in 1991.