New Delhi: A few hours after being sentenced to jail for four years in a corruption case relating to a defence deal, the Delhi High Court in a major relief to ex-Samata Party President Jaya Jaitly, suspended the sentence awarded to her. The orders were passed by a single judge bench of the Delhi High Court. The bench was presided over by Justice Suresh Kumar Kait. He admitted the appeal filed by Jaitly through senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi seeking suspension of her conviction and the sentence awarded later.
Jaitly’s legal team had moved the high court soon after the sentence was pronounced by a Delhi court. It had sentenced Jaitly to four years in jail in a corruption case relating to a defence deal. Two others accused in the case were Jaitly’s former party colleague Gopal Pacherwal and Major General (Retd) SP Murgai. They were also awarded a similar jail term by the court.
While Jaitly approached the High Court Thursday, the other convicts are likely to move the court Friday.
Also read: Ex-Samata Party president Jaya Jaitly, 2 others get 4-year jail terms for corruption in defence deal
Earlier in the day, CBI judge Virender Bhat directed the trio to surrender before the court before 5.00pm Thursday. They have also been fined Rs one lakh each.
The genesis of this case lies in a sting operation conducted by a news website ‘Tehelka’ in 2000-2001 termed ‘Operation Westend’ to expose the corruption in defence procurement deals in India. ‘Tehelka’ had made the operation public in mid-March 2001.
July 20, twenty years after a sting operation was done to expose alleged corruption in a defence deal, the court had convicted Jaya Jaitly, Major General SP Murgai and Gopal K Pacherwal in the case.