Justice S K Mahajan, while issuing notice to CBI, asked the investigating agency to file its reply by September 10, when the matter would come up for hearing. Chandraswami stated in his bail plea that impleadment of former Prime Minister, P V Narasimha Rao, has caused lot of delay in the trial and that he should not suffer in jail because of the impleadment of the former premier.
Chandraswami's counsel, Rajinder Singh, along with Ashok Arora, pleaded for an early hearing in the matter, as the petitioner was lodged in Tihar jail since May three. Chandraswami, along with his associate Kailash Nath Aggarwal was arrested on May two, in pursuance of a arrest warrant issued by the chief metropolitan magistrate, Prem Kumar.
London-based NRI businessman Lakhubhai Pathak had alleged that Chandraswami duped him of one lakh dollars.
in the false promise of securing him newsprint contracts in India.
Former premier Narasimha Rao was summoned as a co-accused in the
case on July nine by Prem Kumar as Pathak, in his testimony before the court, alleged that he paid the money to Chandraswami and his associate on the assurance of Rao, the then external affairs minister, that his work will be done.
Recently, the Supreme Court shifted the trial of the cheating case to a magistrate other than the CMM as Rao pleaded that he had little chance of getting a fair trial in
the court of the CMM.
Chandraswami had moved six bail application in all before the present one, all of which were rejected.
The Delhi high court had rejected the bail petitions thrice.
