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Friday, Jan 11, 2008
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Interim bail for Amarinder and others

Special Correspondent

CHANDIGARH: The District and Sessions Judge of Ludhiana on Thursday granted interim bail till January 22 to the former Punjab Chief Minister, Amarinder Singh, and others who are among the accused in the case registered by the State Vigilance Bureau regarding the multi-crore Ludhiana City Centre (LCC) scam.

The judge handed down the order when Capt. Singh, his son Raninder Singh, relative Ramminder Singh, former Minister Jagjit Singh and others presented themselves before the court, which had issued summons last month. They have been booked under various sections of the IPC for criminal breach of trust, cheating, forgery, forgery of valuable security, forgery for purpose of cheating, using as genuine a forged document and criminal conspiracy, besides the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The Vigilance Bureau, in its 106-page charge on December 21, had accused Capt. Singh and others of illegalities in the multi-crore project, being developed by the Ludhiana Improvement Trust (LIT) in a joint venture with a construction company, Today Homes, on a piece of prime land in the city’s suburbs. The accused had allegedly violated norms “in patronising and abetting the dilution of terms and conditions for favouring a particular party.”

Capt. Singh and the other accused, accompanied by a battery of renowned lawyers of the region, reached the court premises in the morning despite heavy rain. They had to wait for over an hour before the case came up for hearing, where the counsel for the Vigilance opposed the request for regular bail and pressed for continuous arguments. The media were not allowed to enter the courtroom.

Pressing for the grant of regular bail, the counsel for Capt. Singh argued that since the case was registered, the Vigilance Bureau had summoned or interrogated him once, when he joined the investigations. They brought out that Capt. Singh had never violated orders from any court, even if he had travelled abroad. At this, the prosecution sought some more time. The court pronounced its order in the later session after the lunch break.

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