Court grants bail to Jindal’s adviser, others

New Delhi, May 25 (IANS) A court here on Thursday granted regular bail to five persons, including Jindal Steel's adviser Anand Goel, in a coal block allocation case against former Congress MP Naveen Jindal and others.

Special Judge Bharat Parashar also granted bail to JSPL's then Deputy Manager (Finance) Siddharth Madra, Deputy General Manager Rajeev Aggarwal, Director (Finance) Sushil Kumar Maroo and Nihar Stocks Ltd Director B.S.N. Suryanarayan.

The court has directed the accused persons not to tamper with evidence, nor to influence witnesses while on bail.

On March 24, after considering the chargesheet, the court had issued summons to the accused.

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had opposed the bail plea of the accused persons.

The court had on April 4 granted interim bail to the five accused and later extended it up to May 25.

Senior Public Prosecutor V.K. Sharma requested the court to reject the bail plea of Goel and Maroo, alleging that they threatened Suresh Singhal, an accused-turned-approver.

The prosecutor said that during the course of further investigation, it had clearly come on record that Maroo and Goel had threatened Singhal for not disclosing true and correct facts either before the CBI or before this court.

He said that on account of the conduct of these two accused persons in interfering with the course of justice, their applications for bail may kindly be rejected.

The court asked CBI, if there was a threat to the accused, why had they not slapped charges under Section 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code against the two accused.

The court also asked the prosecution tht if the two accused were sent behind bars, would it assure Singhal's safety.

The prosecutor responded that if the two accused were released on bail then there were chances that they might tamper with evidence, influence witnesses or try to hamper the probe.

However, defence counsel Vikas Pahwa submitted that the CBI in its wisdom had chosen not to arrest the present two accused persons during the course of investigation.

He also added that all the five accused persons were respectable members of society and there were no chances of their running away or tampering with the evidence in any manner.

The court granted bail to Goel and Maroo, asking them to furnish a personal bond of Rs one lakh and two sureties of like amount each.

Madra, Suryanarayan and Aggarwal were granted bail on a personal bond of Rs one lakh and one surety each of like amount.

The court listed the matter for July 10 for further hearing.

The CBI has chargesheeted them under the offences of criminal conspiracy, criminal breach of trust and cheating under various provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) as well as criminal misconduct under the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The CBI has alleged that the five persons were actively involved in the transfer of Rs two crore from Jindal Realty and New Delhi Exim Pvt Ltd to Sowbhagya Media Ltd (SML), a company controlled by former Minister of State for Coal Dasari Narayana Rao, in lieu of showing favour in the allotment of Jharkhand's Amarkonda Murgadangal coal block to Jindal Steel and Gagan Sponge.

The final investigation report was filed on the basis of a statement given by a prosecution witness -- Chartered Accountant and New Delhi Exim Pvt Ltd Director Suresh Singhal -- who has turned approver in the case.

The court was hearing the case related to the allocation of Jharkhand's Amarkonda Murgadangal coal block to Jindal Steel and Gagan Sponge.

Besides Congress MP and industrialist Jindal, former Minister of State for Coal Dasari Narayana Rao, former Jharkhand Chief Minister Madhu Koda and former Coal Secretary H.C. Gupta are accused in the case.

The CBI filed a chargesheet against Jindal, Koda, Rao and Gupta in April 2015.

The other accused include Jindal Realty Director Rajeev Jain, Gagan Sponge Directors Girish Kumar Juneja and R.K. Saraf, and Sowbhagya Media's Managing Director K. Ramakrishna.

Of the five private companies named in the chargesheet, four are based in Delhi and one in Hyderabad.

The accused have denied the charges.

(This story has not been edited by Social News XYZ staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)