Police give clean chit to DU professor in murder case
NEW DELHI : The Centre on Monday told the Delhi High Court that it needs to “pierce the corporate veil” of Associated Journal Limited (AJL), the publishers of the National Herald newspaper, to see who owns the premises of the Herald House, which has been leased to it for running a printing press.
Raising questions on the manner in which the shares were transferred to Young India (YI), in which Congress president Rahul Gandhi and his mother Sonia Gandhi are stakeholders, solicitor general Tushar Mehta told a bench of Chief Justice Rajendra Menon and Justice V Kameswar Rao that the land in question was allotted to AJL on lease to run a printing press and this “dominant purpose” was stopped several years ago.
The submissions by the Centre came during the hearing of an appeal by AJL challenging the December 21, 2018 order of a single judge dismissing its plea against the urban development ministry’s October 30 direction that AJL’S 56-year-old lease on Herald House was over and that it should vacate the premises.
The single judge in its order on December 21 had noted that by transfer of AJL’S 99% shares to YI, the beneficial interest of AJL’S property worth ₹413.40 crore stands “clandestinely” transferred to YI. RAIPUR: The Chhattisgarh police have given a clean chit to Delhi University professor Nandini Sundar, Jawaharlal Nehru University professor Archana Prasad and five others in a 2016 murder case, registered at Tongpal police station of Sukma district, a senior police officer said on Monday.
In a chargesheet filed in a local court on Monday, the police said that during investigation no evidence was found against Sundar, JNU professor Archana Prasad, Vineet Tiwari, who is with Delhi’s Joshi Adhikar Sansthan, Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Sanjay Parata, local sarpanch Manju Kawasi and a villager, Mangla Ram Verma, in connection with the murder of Shamnat Baghel, a resident of Nama village in Sukma district.
Jitendra Shukla, superintendent of police, Sukma, said: “After the investigation, police have found no direct evidence against Nandini Sundar and other four in Tongpal murder case. The statements of the villagers were taken which suggests that they were not present at the time of the murder. Hence, we have taken back the cases against them.”
They were booked by Sukma police for murder, criminal conspiracy and rioting on November 7, 2016, on the basis of statement of Baghel’s wife, then Bastar range inspector general of police SRP Kalluri had said.
Kalluri, who is transferred out of Bastar after the case was registered and is now posted as chief of the state’s anti-corruption branch (ACB), did not respond to phone calls from HT.
Sundar said the police have done the right thing by going as per evidence, rather than continuing to concoct absurd theories.
“It was clear that the initial charges were vindictive, coming almost immediately after the CBI chargesheeted special police officers for violence in Tadmetla,” said Sundar, a professor of sociology at DU. “We hope that all ordinary innocent adivasis will also experience the same justice that we have got and charges against them will be dropped very soon,” she added.