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SC admits Harshad's appeal against jail sentence in Maruti case

The Supreme Court today admitted a criminal appeal by one-time 'Big Bull' Harshad Mehta and two others against the verdict of the special court trying the securities scam in Bombay awarding them five years' rigorous imprisonment in the sensational Maruti Udyog Limited fraud case.

The appeal was admitted by a division bench comprising Justice B N Kripal and Justice S Rajendra Babu. The bench ordered that the suspension of sentence ordered by the special court would continue till the disposal of the appeal.

The accused would not leave India without prior permission of the court and those accused who have not surrendered their passports to the Central Bureau of Investigation would do so now, the bench ruled.

It also ordered expeditious hearing of the appeal.

Special judge of the Bombay High Court, Justice M S Rane had also sentenced former deputy finance manager of MUL Pramod Kumar Manocha, former assistant manager of United Commercial Bank Vinayak Deosthali and former officer of ANZ Grindlays Bank Ram Narayan Popli to five years of rigorous imprisonment along with Harshad Mehta in the sensational multi-crore securities scam of 1992.

He had also imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on each failing which the period of rigorous imprisonment would be extended by one year. They have been convicted and sentenced under various provisions and sections of the Indian Penal Code for criminal conspiracy, criminal breach of trust and dishonest misappropriation.

The CBI had alleged that the accused misappropriated four cheques aggregating Rs 389.7 million, drawn by MUL on Canara Bank in favour of ANZ Grindlays Bank and urged for life imprisonment to the accused for criminal conspiracy, punishable under Section 403 of the IPC.

The CBI had found Manocha guilty of criminal conspiracy as a public servant and deputy manager finance in MUL for helping the prime accused Mehta. Manocha dishonestly delivered Rs 3.5 million units of the UTI valued at Rs 49.9 million to Mohan Khandelwal, the then manager of Harshad Mehta's firm at New Delhi. Khandelwal later turned approver and deposed against Mehta.

The CBI accused Vinayak Deosthali, a UCO bank official, of forging a letter on January 23, 1991 with a dishonest intent and authorised remittance of funds to Bank of America, New Delhi, amounting to Rs 49.94 million. He is alleged to have connived with Manocha in transferring the UTI shares to Khandelwal. In this process, he was found to have forged several letters and has been found guilty under the sections of the IPC.

Another accused, Ram Narayan Popli, an officer of the ANZ Grindlays Bank, instead of crediting the Grindlays Bank account, favoured the then 'Big Bull', by transferring money to the tune of Rs 50.50 million in Mehta's account.

However, Ambuj Jain of MUL, a co-accused, was acquitted by the special court judge.

UNI

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