Courts act tough on politicians, terrorists

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Cases involving corporates, politicians and terrorists engaged trial courts, which also advocated strong measures to deal with crime against women like the brutal gangrape of a 23-year-old student at the fag end of the year.
There was national outrage over the gang-rape case even as the courts here on regular intervals asked lawmakers to explore the possibility of providing alternative punishment which at present provides a maximum life term for rape.

A judge even went to the extend of asking lawmakers to think of permitting imposition of alternative sentences like surgical or chemical castration for those guilty in cases of rape and molestation of minors and serial offenders.

The court had also advocated keeping the offenders of sexual assault away from others in a separate cell.

The other matters which kept the courts busy this year were matters relating to corruption involving politicians, bureaucrats and corporates.

Former BJP chief Bangaru Laxman was sentenced to four year imprisonment by a Delhi court for accepting Rs one lakh bribe from fake arms dealers to recommend their name for award of contract to supply thermal binoculars to the army 11 years ago.

Finance Minister P Chidambaram got a clean chit in the 2G spectrum scam case by a Delhi court which said he did not indulge in any criminal conspiracy or derived any pecuniary advantage in the decisions taken with former Telecom Minister A Raja.

While the year was approaching its end, CBI filed a charge sheet against telecom giants Bharti AirtelBSE 0.38 % and Vodafone India in connection with alleged irregularities in allocation of additional spectrum during the NDA regime resulting in a loss of Rs 846 crore to the exchequer.

Sacked CWG chief Suresh Kalmadi, who was granted bail by the Delhi High Court early this year, was named in a charge sheet by a court for “illegally” awarding a contract to install Timing, Scoring and Results system for the 2010 CWG to Swiss Timing Omega.

In a first, former army chief (Retd) Gen V K Singh and top four serving officers, including Vice Chief of Army Staff S K Singh appeared in court in a criminal defamation case filed by Lt Gen (retd) Tejinder Singh.

A verbal duel between two BJP and Congress politicians landed one of them in trouble with a court here summoning senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh to appear before it to face trial in a criminal defamation case lodged against him by BJP chief Nitin Gadkari on coal block allocation.

Former Union minister Anbumani Ramadoss also faced the heat this year with CBI listing him in a charge sheet for allegedly abusing his office in allowing a Indore-based medical college to go ahead with admissions without sufficient infrastructure.

MNS chief Raj Thackeray too faced criminal proceedings along with late Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray and his son Uddhav Thackeray in a host of complaints for their alleged anti-Bihari remarks.

As the year saw a rise in crime against women, it also saw courts acting tough on perpetrators of such crimes.

In one such case, which was the first honour killing in the capital, a Delhi court awarded death penalty to five members of a family for mercilessly torturing and then electrocuting the girl and her partner, who belonged to a different caste.

The first quarter of the year also saw special NIA court issuing non-bailable warrants against US-born terroristDavid Coleman Headley, his Pakistani-cum-Canadian accomplice Tahawwur Rana, LeT founder Hafiz Saeedand 26/11 Mumbai attack mastermind Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi and two serving Pakistani army officers and others for allegedly carrying out several terror strikes in the country.

With all the hype about nexus between politicians and businessmen came the coal scam, which also saw a media house facing the heat. Two senior editors of Zee were arrested for their alleged Rs 100 crore extortion bid from Naveen Jindal’s firm in return of not airing news about Congress MP firm’s alleged role in coal scam.

Top boss of Zee Group Subhash Chandra and his son Punit Goenka are also facing probe in the matter even as the two editors are now out on bail.

The glamour and blitz of IPL took an ugly turn when Australian cricketer Luke Pomersbach, then playing forRoyal Challengers Bangalore, was arrested on molestation charge here. The case was withdrawn by the US-based woman, who had alleged she was molested by Luke.

The case relating to the anti-Sikh riots in Delhi Cantonment area here in which senior Congress leader Sajjan Kumar along with five others is facing trial, reached its final stage. Arguments are about to conclude in the case in which six Sikhs were allegedly killed area during the riots.

Sajjan Kumar and the five others are facing trial for allegedly instigating a mob to kill the Sikhs.

Another old case relating to the killing of former Railway Minister Lalit Narayan Mishra in 1975 in a bomb blast at a function at Samastipur Railway Station in Bihar, was also at the concluding stage of trial in a Delhi court. The case was transferred from Bihar to Delhi on the apex court’s directions.

A corruption case involving former Haryana chief minister O P Chautala and his son Ajay Chautala will be decided by a court here in January. The case relates to alleged illegal recruitment of over 3000 junior basic trained teachers in Haryana during 1999-2000.

The rivalry of two brothers, liquor-baron Ponty Chadha and Hardeep Chadha, took an ugly turn when both the brothers were killed in a shoot out in November. Ponty’s close aide S S Namdhari, sacked Uttarakhandminority panel chief, and his personal security officer Sachin Tyagi were among the others arrested by police.

Several of Ponty’s men were arrested after the shootout at Chadhas Chattarpur farmhouse for various criminal cases linked to the incident. Namdhari, who was termed as the main conspirator in the shootout, was also booked for murder.

The year also saw a series of cheating and forgery cases coming up against arms dealer Abhishek Verma, an accused in the Naval War room leak case, and his Romanian wife Anca Maria which had them shuttling between jail and courts.

The list of cases also had the 2G spectrum scam which had led to former Telecom Minister A Raja, DMK MP Kanimozhi and other corporate executives going behind bars. While others were released last year, Raja could get bail early this year.

 

PTI

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