The Hindu : New Delhi News : Sukh Ram plea for case transfer dismissed

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Oct 10, 2007
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New Delhi

New Delhi

Sukh Ram plea for case transfer dismissed

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Tuesday dismissed a petition by former Union Communications Minister Sukh Ram seeking transfer of his disproportionate assets case to another court, submitting that the matter had been lingering on in the court here for long without any signs of it being decided in the near future.

Dismissing the petition, Justice B.N. Chaturvedi said transferring the case on ground of tardy trial as alleged by the accused would amount to a serious comment on the conduct of the presiding trial court judge and thus will have a demoralising effect on him. Mr. Justice Chaturvedi directed Sukh Ram to appear before the trial court on October 15 for further proceedings. The trial has been going since 2001.

The CBI’s allegation against Sukh Ram is that he had amassed disproportionate assets valued at more than Rs.5 crore between 1991 and 1996. The case is an offshoot of the telecom equipment supply case of 1996 involving Sukh Ram, then Deputy Director-General (Lease-Financing) of the Department of Telecom (DoT) Runu Ghosh, and Hyderabad-based businessman Pataru Rama Rao.

A court here in 2002 had sentenced Sukh Ram to three years’ rigorous imprisonment in the equipment supply case for making Rama Rao, Managing Director of the Advance Radio Masts (ARM) Pvt. Ltd. of Hyderabad, richer by Rs. 1.66 crore at the cost of the taxpayers’ money.

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