The Delhi High Court on Friday directed former Haryana Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala, who was released on interim bail after being convicted in a teachers’ recruitment scam case, to surrender before the trial court on or before October 17. Mr. Chautala had addressed a massive rally at Jind in Haryana on Thursday.
Justice Siddharth Mridul of the High Court, before whom the plea for extension of Mr. Chautala’s bail came up, passed the order after observing that the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) leader should have sought the Court’s permission for attending rallies while he was out on bail.
Mr. Chautala’s counsel informed the Court that he was airlifted to Jind in an air-ambulance with the permission of doctors treating him at a private hospital in Gurgaon.
When the Judge said he was inclined to appoint a medical board of experts from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) to give an opinion on the need to keep Mr. Chautala hospitalised, his counsel said Mr. Chautala was ready to surrender by the date fixed by the Court.
The CBI counsel contended that the INLD leader would not have been able to address the rally if he was medically unfit. He said Mr. Chautala was misleading both the Court and the investigating agency by producing medical records on each date of hearing, showing that he was seriously ill. However, Mr. Chautala’s counsel said the Jind rally was organised to celebrate the 100th birth anniversary of his father Devi Lal.
The Court disposed of Mr. Chautala’s bail application while directing him to surrender before the CBI special court, which had convicted and sentenced him to 10 years’ imprisonment on January 22 last year. Along with Mr. Chautala, his son Ajay Chautala and eight others were also sentenced to 10-year jail term each in the case.
The matter pertains to illegal recruitment of 3,206 junior teachers in Haryana in 2000. The 55 convicts in the case were held guilty of cheating, forgery, using fake documents as genuine, conspiracy and abusing their official position.
The Court extended interim bail of Mr. Ajay Chautala, who is an INLD MLA, and Sher Singh Badshami till October 31 and that of Vidya Dhar and Sanjiv Kumar till October 17. The High Court had on July 11 this year reserved its judgment on the appeals of all the 55 convicts in the case against the trial court’s verdict.
