The Hindu : Business : Birlas file criminal petition against Lodha

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Oct 06, 2004

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Birlas file criminal petition against Lodha

By Indrani Dutta

Lawyer, Ram Jethmalani comes out of the Alipore Court after filing a criminal suite against R. S. Lodha on behalf of the Birlas in Kolkata on Tuesday. — Photo: Parth Sanyal

KOLKATA, OCT. 5. The Birlas have initiated criminal proceedings against Rajendra Singh Lodha, giving a new dimension to the ongoing battle for ownership of assets of the M P Birla group. Noted lawyer Ram Jethmalani appeared for the Birlas for first time in the Birla-Lodha legacy battle.

The petition has been filed by Subhas Pansari at the Alipore Sessions court under Section 420 of the IPC (cheating), Section 120 B (criminal consipracy) and 467 (forgery of valuable security documents and Will), besides various other sections, including destruction of evidence. The petitioner was the secretary of three charitable institutions under the M P Birla fold.

Delivering his order at the end of a long rainwashed day, the Chief Judicial Magistrate (south 24 parganas), Md Mumtaz Khan, issued summons to Mr. Lodha and three other key executives of Priyamavada Birla, but refused to grant the petitioner's prayer for a search warrant for retrieving the trust documents and the paper through which the trusts were dissolved. The order directed Mr. Lodha and others to appear before the court on November 29 and show cause why the search warrant should not be issued.

Debanjan Mondal of Fox and Mandal, solicitors to Mr. Lodha described the entire issue as `absurd and motivated' saying that the petition contained baseless allegations.

The main contention of today's petition was in April 1999, the late Priyamvada Birla had, at the behest of her auditor Mr. Lodha, revoked five trusts before dissolving them into three charitable institutions. Thereafter according to the 1999 Will (made three days later) she is alleged to have bequeathed these to Mr. Lodha.

Mr. Jethmalani, during his submissions, said Mr. Lodha had conspired to revoke the thrust deed made by M P Birla and his wife.

He alleged that Mr. Lodha had committed a fraud by giving Priyamvada Birla the false notion that the trusts were being willed to public charity. The petition claimed that the estimated value of the property held by these trusts was Rs. 2,400 crores.

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