BABRI DEMOLITION CASE: KALYAN SINGH GETS BAIL

LUCKNOW: Bharatiya Janata

Party leader and former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Kalyan Singh was granted bail by a special Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) court on Friday in a criminal conspiracy case related to the 1992 demolition of the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. The court, which is conducting a trial into a case also in which other senior BJP leaders including LK Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Uma Bharti are named, issued a summons to Kalyan Singh earlier this month. Singh’s immunity from criminal proceedings, which he got because he held a constitutional post as the governor of Rajasthan, ended when his tenure expired on September 3. Special CBI judge SK Yadav granted bail after fixing charges against Singh under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code. NEW DELHI: The government has granted sanction to the Central Bureau of Investigation to prosecute former NITI Aayog chief executive officer Sindhushree Khullar and other officials in connection with alleged irregularities in Foreign Investment Promotion Board clearance given to INX Media more than a decade ago, an official requesting anonymity. Khullar, who was additional secretary in the department of economic affairs from April 2007 till September 2008, when the alleged FIPB clearance was granted to the INX Media, will be first bureaucrat to be prosecuted in this case. Former finance minister P Chidambaram is an accused in the case, and currently lodged in Tihar Jail.

The approval comes days after former PM Manmohan Singh questioned why the Congress leader had been arrested when he had approved a “unanimous” recommendation by a dozen officials, including six secretaries .

According to the official cited above, the government has also given prosecution sanction against former secretary of the ministry of micro, small and medium enterprises, Anup K Pujari, the then director in the finance ministry Prabodh Saxena and former under-secretary in the department of economic affairs, Rabindra Prasad.