Supreme Court extends bail granted to Teesta Setalvad, her husband

The Supreme Court on Wednesday extended till April 29, the anticipatory bail granted to social activist Teesta Setalvad and her husband Javed Anand in an embezzlement case related to riot victims of Gulberg society in Gujarat.

A three-judge bench of Justices Anil R. Dave, Ibrahim Kalifulla and V. Gopala Gowda extended the anticipatory bail after hearing senior counsel Kapil Sibal and Ms Kamini Jaiswal, appearing for the petitioners and senior counsel Mahesh Jethmalani for Gujarat and solicitor-general Ranjit Kumar for the CBI.

The bench requested Chief Justice of India T.S. Thakur to post the matter before a regular three-judge bench as sitting in different combinations, it has become difficult for them to hear the matter fully.

The bench is also hearing appeals filed by the petitioners against certain observations made by the Bombay high court in its judgment granting anticipatory bail to them in the “foreign contribution case” and posted the matter for further hearing on January 21, 2016. The CBI had also filed an appeal against the impugned judgment, granting them bail. Among the allegations levelled against them by the Gujarat government is a case of fraud related to a proposed plan to build a memorial for the victims of the Gulberg Society killings.

The CBI submitted that Sabrang Communications and Publishing Pvt. Ltd run by Ms Setalvad and Mr Anand received funds to the tune of $2,90,000 from US-based Ford Foundation. This was in violation of the FCRA and also they had misused the funds received.