While cancelling the anticipatory bail granted to P V Prabhakar Rao, son of former Prime Minister Narasimha Rao, the Supreme Court yesterday set tough conditions for grant of such bail for accused caught in colossal scams.
The apex court stated that while examining applications for anticipatory bail, the courts should look into the magnitude of the criminal conspiracy, the ingenuity of the execution and the gravity of the economic offence. This test would affect the fate of political heavyweights who are involved in mammoth scams.
Prabhakar Rao was involved in a conspiracy related to the Rs 133 crore urea scam. It is suspected that he had used his influence with his father to help the offenders in the urea import which never materialised, though amount was paid from the exchequer.
When he was summoned for interrogation, Rao avoided it several times.
Meanwhile, he approached the Andhra Pradesh High Court for anticipatory bail. The court granted bail on his plea that he was suffering from spondylitis. Therefore, the Enforcement Directorate appealed to the Supreme Court.
A three-judge bench comprising Justice M K Mukherjee, Justice S P Kurdukar and Justice K T Thomas cancelled the anticipatory bail, thus giving a free hand to the Enforcement Directorate to take action against Rao any moment now.
The Supreme Court criticised the high court for granting him bail even after going through the records and finding that the materials in them pointed an accusing finger at Rao.
Fodder scam
PATNA
Former Bihar Chief Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav will be produced before a special court today in a conspiracy angle case of the fodder scam.
Yadav, remanded to judicial custody in the case till today, by special judge S K Lal, is presently lodged in a make-shift jail at old IPS mess at Fulwarisharif on the outskirts of Patna.
Yadav on July 30 surrendered before the special judge after the apex court rejected his anticipatory bail plea in the particular conspiracy case. The special judge also turned down Yadavs plea for regular bail.
Hawala case hearing
NEW DELHI
The Supreme Court will take up from September 2, the hearing of a special leave petition by the CBI, challenging a Delhi High Court verdict discharging BJP president L K Advani, former Union minister V C Shukla and others in the hawala case on the ground that the Jain diaries did not constitute admissible evidence.
The date for the hearing was fixed by a three judge bench comprising Justice M K Mukherjee, Justice S P Kurdurkar and Justice K T Thomas.
Notice to CBI on JMM case
NEW DELHI
The Delhi High Court yesterday issued notice to CBI on the plea of three JMM leaders, Suraj Mandal, Shibu Soren and Simon Marandi, seeking quashing of charges framed against them by the trial court in the multi-crore bribery case.
Justice Jaspal Singh, while issuing notice to the investigating agency, which had chargesheeted 21 persons including former Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao in the case, posted the case for further hearing on August 8.
Rao was first among the accused who had approached the court for quashing of the charges framed against him by the trial court.
CBI had chargesheeted four JMM leaders - Mandal, Marandi, Soren and Sahilendra Mahato.
However, the trial court had granted pardon to Mahato after he turned approver in the case admitting that he had received the bribe.
Kickback in HDW deal
NEW DELHI
The CBI yesterday told the Delhi High Court that kickback was paid in India in the Rs 420 crore HDW submarine deal of 1987 and investigations in this regard have made satisfactory progress.
Additional solicitor general K N Bhat, appearing for CBI, told a division bench comprising Justice Mahinder Narain and Justice S K Mahajan that we are at a stage (of investigation) where there is a belief that commission was paid.
Somebody has paid and somebody in India (has) received bribe (in the deal), Bhat said adding that there is hope for some kind of breakthrough (in the case).
The bench directed the CBI to file a status report of the probe after two months and posted the matter for further hearing on October 20.
A public interest litigation filed by B L Wadhera had alleged that in 1987, the then Indian ambassador to Germany J C Ajmani had told the then defence minister, V P Singh, that Germans could not reduce the price of HDW submarines because the HDW company had paid seven per cent commission to Indian middlemen.
Wadhera had alleged that though 10 years have passed since the deal took place, CBI investigations into the kickback issue were lax and had sought a direction from the court for speedy completion of the probe.
