Hooda fails to appear before Dhingra panel

The former Haryana CM was represented by a battery of lawyers

NEW DELHI, 04/08/2012: Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda during an interview to `The Hindu' on the State's achievements in the field of Sports, in New Delhi. Photo: V. Sudershan

: Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Friday failed to appear before the Justice S.N. Dhingra Commission, which is making inquiries into grant and rejection of licences in four villages of Gurgaon including the licences granted to Robert Vadra's company.

The panel said that the former Haryana Chief Minister has the liberty to not depose before the commission, adding that it would draw “adverse inferences” from it.

The commission had last week (March 17) summoned Mr. Hooda to record his statements regarding the allotment of land to the Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra promoted Skylight Hospitality company.

Mr. Hooda, who also headed the Town and Country Planning Department during the grant and rejection of CLU licences in the four villages, had claimed that nothing wrong was done during his tenure as CM, adding that allegations against him were politically motivated.

The CM was represented by a battery of lawyers on Friday.

Explaining the reason for Mr. Hooda’s absence, counsel Narender Hooda said that the former CM was not given any details in the notice about the complaints against him.

“There were no complaints, if any, attached with the notice. So today [Friday] we have submitted a representation to the commission to supply us the material base on which they want to ask questions to Mr. Hooda,” said the counsel, while assuring the commission that Mr. Hooda would appear before it after all the material was supplied to him.

The counsel also added that the commission passed an order in “undue haste”.Justice Dhingra, however, told The Hindu that Mr. Hooda’s counsel had “wrongly interpreted” the commission’s order. “We had written in the notice that since Mr. Hooda was the final approving authority in grant and rejection of licences, he should come to explain some orders passed by him on some files. The details sought by Mr. Hooda from the commission are available online and there was no need for the commission to supply the same to him. We will draw adverse inference since he has not come today. There is no need to provide him fresh opportunity for examination.”

Though the commission was supposed to submit its report by December 8, 2015, its tenure was extended by six months till June 7 this year.