PAROLE SHOCK FOR CHAUTALA

NEW DELHI The Delhi high court on Wednesday cancelled the parole and furlough granted to INLD chief OP Chautala on medical grounds and asked him to “surrender forthwith”, saying he cocked a snook at the court and “misled” it by feigning illness.

Justice Vipin Sanghi issued the direction on a complaint by a private person alleging that the former Haryana chief minister, serving 10-year jail term in a teachers’ recruitment scam case, was misusing his parole to attend public meetings.

Cancelling the parole granted to him by the court on February 6 this year, the judge also scrapped the three-week furlough granted to him by the prison authorities.

Referring to media reports and pictures attached to the complaint, the court said they showed that Chautala was “hale and hearty and attending public meetings from time to time”.

The lawyers appearing for Chautala contended that press reports did not disclose he was attending public meetings and also claimed that all the places mentioned in the news were cities where people gathered to meet him while he was on the way to his village.

The court, however, did not accept this contention.

It said that in 2013, his interim bail on medical ground was cancelled as he was found misusing it by campaigning for his party, INLD, and now “once again petitioner (Chautala) is found indulging in political activities while on parole”.

The court said the parole was granted to the 82-year-old politician despite opposition from the Delhi government “by believing that he was suffering from ailments and needs parole to receive treatment privately”, but he has “breached the trust reposed in him”.

“The same modus operandi has been used by petitioner and this conduct of petitioner is incorrigible”, it said and added “complete fraud you are playing with the court. You can’t cock a snook and get away with it”.

“Petitioner has clearly breached the trust reposed in him by the court by believing that he is in urgent need for medical attention,” it added.

The court noted that the INLD leader had played “the old age and medical condition cards”

The court also said that the period spent on parole “will not be counted towards period of sentence undergone” by Chautala.

Chautala, his son Ajay Chautala and three others are serving 10-year jail term in the case.