Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, his wife Pratibha Singh, and others on Monday appeared before a Delhi court in a disproportionate assets case.
They appeared before Additional Sessions Judge Virender Kumar Goyal and applied for bail, except accused Anand Chauhan. The judge posted their bail applications for May 29 for arguments as the CBI sought time to file replies.
Taking cognisance of the CBI charge sheet, the judge on May 9 summoned them for Monday.
The other accused in the case are LIC agent Anand Chauhan, Tarini Infrastructure managing director Vakamulla Chandrashekhar, Universal Apples Associates (Himachal Pradesh) owner Chunni Lal Chauhan, Prem Raj, Lavan Kumar Roach, Ram Prakash Bhatia and Joginder Singh Ghalta.
Mr. Bhatia and Mr. Chauhan are in judicial custody.
CBI’s charge
The CBI has accused Mr. Singh of amassing assets worth ₹10.30 crore between May 2009 and June 2012, when he was Union Steel Minister.
The agency has alleged that the LIC agent helped Mr. Singh invest unaccounted money in life insurance policies.
In his annual returns, Mr. Singh later showed the additional amount as income from the sale of apples from his orchard.
An MoU was later prepared showing the LIC agent as the orchard manager. Mr. Raj and Mr. Roach were shown as witnesses. The probe agency further alleged that invoices claiming sale of apples to Universal Apples Associates were created.
However, the Income-Tax Department did not buy the explanation, after which an inquiry was launched and the CBI registered the case in September 2015.
