Corruption charges could not be framed against former Punjab and Haryana High Court judge Nirmal Yadav Tuesday in the cash-at-door scandal despite her appearing in a CBI special court here.
Yadav’s counsel told the trial judge that she had moved the high court against the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) special court’s July 31 decision to frame charges against her.
Trial judge Vimal Kumar adjourned the case till Sep 15 after Yadav’s counsel argued that her plea will come up for hearing before the high court Aug 30.
The trial court July 31 ordered framing of charges against Yadav in the Rs.1.5 million scandal in which a packet containing Rs.1.5 million was found outside the door of a high court judge Nirmaljit Kaur’s house Aug 13, 2008 in Sector 11 here. She complained to police and got a case registered.
Yadav was also a judge in the high court when the scandal came to light.
Police later arrested the (then) Haryana additional advocate general Sanjeev Bansal, property dealer Rajiv Gupta and Delhi-based hotelier Ravinder Singh in the case.
Police claimed Bansal and Gupta told them that the money was meant for Nirmal Yadav.
The two claimed that another packet containing Rs.1.5 million was separately delivered to Yadav at her Sector 24 official residence later, since the first packet was wrongly delivered to the other woman judge, police said.
A case was registered by Chandigarh Police initially and later the investigation was handed over to the CBI.
Despite objections from Yadav, the Supreme Court had set up an independent enquiry into the case. The high court, in 2011, directed Yadav to appear before the trial court.
Yadav was later transferred to the Uttarakhand High Court from where she retired in 2012.
The CBI filed a chargesheet against Yadav for corruption, conspiracy, destruction of evidence and creation of false evidence.
(Source: IANS)
