Subramanian Swamy plea to bar foreign travel rejected
Subramanian Swamy plea to bar foreign travel rejected
The Congress’ legal battle has begun. Party chief Sonia Gandhi, son Rahul and others were on Saturday granted unconditional bail in the high-voltage National Herald case by a local court after a 10-minute hearing. All the leaders accused in the case appeared before the court with the top brass of the Congress.
Facing a private criminal complaint lodged by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy relating to the transfer of shares of the defunct party newspaper National Herald to a newly-created company, the two Gandhis, accompanied by former PM Manmohan Singh, besides Priyanka Gandhi, appeared before metropolitan magistrate Lovleen at 2.50 pm.
A smiling Mrs Gandhi, closely followed by her son, emerged from the Patiala House courts complex in the heart of the capital after 15 minutes of proceedings.
The party’s lawyers — Kapil Sibal, Abhishek Manu Singhvi and others — as also top Congress leaders such as Ghulam Nabi Azad, Mallikarjun Kharge, A.K. Antony, Ahmed Patel, Sheila Dikshit, Mohsina Kidwai, Ambika Soni and Meira Kumar, were at hand. While Mr Sibal is fighting the case for Mrs Gandhi, Mr Singhvi is representing Mr Rahul Gandhi.
The Gandhis and three other accused in the case — Motilal Vora, Oscar Fernandes and Suman Dubey — sought bail which was granted after they furnished personal bonds of Rs 50,000 and one surety each. One of the accused, Sam Pitroda, was not present as he was stated to be unwell.
Mr Swamy pressed the court to impose conditions on the foreign travel of the accused, which was not accepted by the court. He said later that he had not opposed the bail but had told the court that conditions should be imposed on the Gandhis’ travel abroad since they “were in the habit of running away from the country”.
The magistrate fixed February 20 as the next date of hearing while making it clear that no exemption from personal appearance would be granted to any accused. The judge, who held the proceedings in a closed room, asked Mr Swamy to bring all relied-upon documents in support of his complaint on the next date of hearing.
The proceedings were over within minutes after which the Gandhis came out smiling. They had to navigate through jostling lawyers, journalists, securitymen and party workers to reach their cars.
Later, addressing the media at AICC headquarters here, Mrs Gandhi, Mr Gandhi and Dr Singh hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, accusing him of levelling “false allegations” against them and making “full use” of government agencies to “deliberately target” the Opposition. “We will continue the fight and not bow down,” they said.
“The accused are reputed persons having deep political grassroots and there is no apprehension that they will flee,” the magistrate noted while granting them bail.
While Mr Antony provided surety for Mrs Gandhi, Ms Priyanka Gandhi stood surety for her brother Rahul. Congress leader B.K. Hariprasad gave surety for Mr Vora, Mr Azad for Mr Fernandes and Mr Ajay Maken for Mr Dubey.
