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| SC grants bail to Sidhu | | | NEW DELHI, JAN 12
Cricketer-turned-politician Navjot Singh Sidhu, who is in Patiala jail, was today granted bail by the Supreme Court which also sought response from the Punjab Government on his plea seeking suspension of his conviction in a road rage case to contest Amritsar Lok Sabha bypoll.
While granting bail to the 43-year-old former internationla cricketer, a Division Bench comprising Justice G P Mathur and Justice L S Panta asked him to furnish a personal bond of Rs 25,000 and surety of like amount before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, Patiala.
Sidhu, who resigned as BJP MP following his conviction and a three-year imprisonment last month for culpable homicide, was sent to Patiala jail after he surrendered to a court in Chandigarh yesterday.
The Bench issued notice to Punjab Government for January 17 to hear Sidhu's plea seeking suspension of his conviction and sentence so that he could contenst the bypolls to the Amritsar Lok Sabha constituency which will be held along with the Assembly polls in the state on February 13.
The court also granted bail to Sidhu's friend and co-accused Rupinder Singh Sandhu and admitted their appeals against the verdict of the Punjab and Haryana High Court convicting them for the death of 65-year-old Gurnam Singh in 1988.
The court also admitted the appeal filed by the victim's relative Jaswinder Singh seeking enhancement of the sentence and including the offence of murder under section 302 of the IPC.
Senior Advocate Harish Salve, appearing for Sidhu said, it was a clear case of acquittal as held by the trial court and the conviction by the High Court was based on the ground of defective investigation.
"Defective investigation was made the ground of conviction," he said referring to the High Court verdict.
However, when the Bench said that normally the court does not suspend or stay the conviction, Salve said the High Court verdict was coming in way of political career of the former cricketer.
It was only a case of simple injury and Sidhu could have been let off on probation, he submitted adding that there was no evidence against him and the High Court wronglly concluded that sub-dural haemorrhage resulted in the death of the victim.
The senior advocate said trial court acquittal of Siddhu was based on the pathological report of the victim which had opined that the man had collapsed due to strain.
However, senior advocate Rakesh Dwivedi, appearing for the complainant refuted the contention and said it was directly a case of homicide as the victim died allegedly of the fist blow and there was no dispute about the incident where Sidhu was present.
He said it was alleged that that the 65-year-old victim was pulled from the car and was inflicted with fist blows.
"As a responsible citizen the accused (Sidhu) should have taken the man to the hospital," he said countering the argument that his political career was at stake.
However, the court in a lighter vein said "at that time he was not a law maker".
Dwivedi, continuing with his arguments said that since police itself did not acted immediately speaks of the incident.
At this, the Bench said "there is a serious allegation".
The senior advocate said how could Sidhu get away with the offence as it was a "full-proof" and "shut case" under section 304 of IPC. |
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