HC stays sentence, ₹25L fine on Koda

NEW DELHI: The Delhi High Court on Tuesday stayed a trial court order awarding three-year jail term to former Jharkhand chief minister Madhu Koda in a coal scam case till January 22, by when it has also sought response of the CBI on his appeal challenging the conviction and sentence.

Justice Anu Malhotra also stayed the order imposing a fine of Rs 25 lakh on Koda, who was present in the court, and granted him interim bail till the next date of hearing this month with a direction that he will not leave the country.

The order came on Koda’s plea seeking suspension of sentence and regular bail till pendency of his appeal before the high court.

Koda, who was held guilty of corruption and conspiracy in allocation of a Jharkhandbased coal block to Kolkatabased company Vini Iron and Steel Udyog Ltd (VISUL), also challenged the December 13 and 16, 2017 orders of conviction and sentence respectively, which was admitted by the high court.

The former chief minister was granted bail by a trial court till January 18.

In his appeal, Koda said the trial court order holding him guilty was bad in law.

The appeal and stay on the fine was opposed by CBI counsel Tarannum Cheema. The agency, however, did not oppose interim bail granted to Koda till January 22.

The high court had on December 22, 2017 stayed a trial court order imposing a fine of Rs 50 lakh on VISUL in the case till the next date of hearing.

The high court on December 20 had sought response of the CBI on an appeal by Koda’s close aide Vijay Joshi against the trial court’s order awarding him three years jail term in the coal scam case.

All the pleas filed so far in connection with this matter will be heard on January 22.

Koda, ex-coal secretary H C Gupta, A K Basu, former Jharkhand chief secretary, and Joshi were awarded jail terms of three years for indulging in corrupt practices and hatching a criminal conspiracy in the allocation of Rajhara North coal block in Jharkhand to the Kolkata-based company.

While sentencing the convicts, the special court had said “white collar crimes” were more “dangerous” to the society than ordinary crimes.

It had imposed fines of Rs 50 lakh, Rs 25 lakh and Rs 1 lakh on VISUL, Koda and Gupta respectively in the Upaera coal scam. Rs one lakh fine was also imposed on Basu.

The convicts were granted statutory bail for a period of two months to enable them to file appeals in the Delhi High Court.

So far, four out of 30 coal block allocation scam cases have been decided by the special court, including this order, and 12 people and four companies have been held guilty.

The convicts were tried for offences under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) read with 420 (cheating) and 409 (criminal breach of trust by public servants) of the IPC and under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act. NEW DELHI: Congress in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday asked the government that “genuine” citizens should not be left out of the draft National Register of Citizens (NRC) for Assam.

Raising the issue during Zero Hour, Sushmita Dev (Cong) said that the first draft list has come out. The apex court had on November 30 last year said that on the expiry of midnight of December 31 last year, the draft NRC pertaining to 2.38 crore claims should be published. The NRC is being prepared to identify illegal migrants in Assam.

“I request that no genuine citizens should be left out of this,” she said. The NRC of 1951 is being updated for Assam in accordance with the tripartite agreement between the state and central governments and the All Assam Students Union (AASU), which was arrived at in 2005 to implement the 1985 Assam Accord.

Jyotiraditya Scindia (also Cong) demanded a CBI probe into the alleged suicide by a policeman, who was found hanging from wireless tower in Madhya Pradesh’s Ashoknagar last month.

Scindia said a paper found in his pocket had names of certain police officers, who had allegedly harassed him.

As per reports, Assistant Sub-inspector Satish Raghuwanshi (55) was in uniform when his body was found hanging from a tower located between Kotwali and Dehat (rural) police stations. NEW DELHI: The railways is planning a standardisation of trains in terms of number of coaches so that all trains can run on all routes, Railway Minister Piyush Goyal said here on Tuesday. Soon, all trains in the Indian Railway network would have 22 coaches, making them suitable for running on any route, irrespective of the time taken by each to complete the journey, he added.

“All trains will have 22 coaches, the length of the plat- forms will be increased and other related changes will be carried out. The engineering department is looking into it,” Goyal told reporters.

Currently, coaches are of two kinds -- ICF and LHB -and the number of coaches in a train could be 12, 16, 18, 22 or 26, depending on its demand, making it difficult for the railways to substitute one with the other, particularly in case of a delay.

“If the number of coaches is the same in every train, we can press any train -- which is ready, has arrived at the station and undergone maintenance -into operation, instead of waiting for the same train to get ready,” a senior railway official explained. Government of West Bengal North Bengal Development Department Branch Secretariat Uttarkanya, Fulbari, Jalpaiguri