With the Delhi high court not listing the reserved judgement on the bail petition of DMK MP Kanimozhi for pronouncement in the 2G scam case on Friday, the last day before its’ closure for the summer vacation, she is certain to cool her heels in Tihar Jail for longer time as the HC will now reopen on July 4. Any grim hope for
pronouncing of the bail order during the month-long vacation would arise only if the name of Justice Ajit Bharioke, who heard her petition, is included in the roster of the vacation judges, several senior advocates practising in the HC said when asked whether the bail order could be pronounced during the vacation.
The senior lawyers familiar with the rules and procedure on the functioning of the HC also cited the rejection of the bail petitions of five corporate honchos earlier on May 24 by Justice Bharioke as another reason for Kanimozhi not to expect an early relief. “In any criminal case arising out of the same FIR and same set of chargesheet, the law of equity demands that all the accused are treated on par,” advocate Ashok Arora said.
Before reserving the verdict, Justice Bharioke had sought a report from the CBI about the status of the investigation, which the agency has not yet completed as its team is looking into the foreign transactions and currently is focusing on the Mauritius route.
Five corporate honchos denied bail by the HC earlier included, Unitech group MD Sanjay Chandra, Reliance ADAG’s Gautam Doshi, Surendra Pipara and Hari Nair and Swan Telecom’s Vinod Goenka. All these accused had been lodged in Tihar since April 20.
The bail applications of other accused, including former telecom minister A. Raja, his former private secretary R.K. Chandolia, former telecom secretary Sidharatha Behura and DB Realty’s owner Shahid Balwa, his cousin Asif Balwa and Shahid’s close aide Rajiv Agrawal had been rejected by the special judge.
The legal experts feel that in a high profile case like this with multi-dimensional investigation by different agencies within the country and abroad, getting bail at this stage would not be easy, especially when the CBI has not yet completed the investigation and the probe agencies required to submit periodic reports to the Supreme Court, which is monitoring the investigation.
Now the eyes of all those arrested in the case, are focused on the next move of the five corporate honchos as and when they move the Supreme Court for bail.