The Delhi High Court today granted parole for one day to ex-Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala, serving a 10-year jail term in teachers’ recruitment scam case, to attend his grandson and MP Dushyant Chautala’s engagement on January 3, 2017.
Justice Vipin Sanghi ordered Chautala’s release for a day on his furnishing a bond of Rs 50,000 and directed the INLD leader to surrender on January 4 at 11 AM.
The court said it will hear Chautala’s main petition against the Delhi government’s December 14, 2016 decision dismissing his plea for six months’ parole on medical grounds, on January 17.
The INLD leader, in his interim application filed through advocate Amit Sahni, had sought two days’ parole to attend his grandson’s ‘roka’ and ‘ring’ ceremonies.
The Delhi government opposed the grant of interim parole saying Ajay Chautala, also a convict in the case, was already out on parole to attend the marriage function of his son Dushyant.
Sahni, however, said that as per the parole norms, under special circumstances like in the instant case, two convicts of a case can be granted the relief simultaneously.
In his main plea, O P Chautala has contended that the Delhi government’s December 14 decision was passed in “an extremely unfair manner upon flimsy grounds”.
82-year-old Chautala also said that he is “polio-affected since his birth and has permanent disability of 60 per cent”.
He said he was on bail during the trial and was released on parole, but he has never misused the same.
Chautala, his son Ajay and three others are serving 10-years jail term in the case.
The Supreme Court on August 3 last year had dismissed the Chautalas’ appeals against the high court’s verdict upholding their conviction and sentence of 10 years awarded by a trial court in the junior basic trained (JBT) teachers recruitment scam case.
The high court had on March 5, 2015 upheld the 10-year jail term awarded to Chautalas and three others, saying, “The overwhelming evidence showed spine-chilling state of affairs in the country.”
The father-son duo and 53 others, including two IAS officers, were among 55 persons convicted on January 16, 2013 by the trial court for illegally recruiting 3,206 JBT teachers in Haryana in 2000.
( Source – PTI )
