Subrata Roy on parole for 4 weeks

To perform last rites and attend ceremonies following death of his mother

Don't want to miss the best from Business Standard?

The Supreme Court on Friday ordered the provisional release of Sahara group chief Subrata Roy for four weeks.

Roy and his brother-in-law Ashok Roy Choudhary, lodged in Tihar jail since March 2014, had moved an application seeking provisional release for three weeks to perform the last rites of Roy’s mother who passed away on Friday. Chabbi Roy, 95, passed away in Lucknow at around 1:30am after a prolonged illness, a Sahara release said.

Read more from our special coverage on "SUBRATA ROY"

• SC to hear Subrata Roys parole plea today
• Sahara chief Subrata Roys mother passes away
• Weeks before being jailed, Sahara chief Subrata Roy wanted to go abroad: Sebi lawyer
• Writing from behind bars

After hearing the plea, the bench headed by T S Thakur permitted the release for four weeks for ‘last rites and connected ceremonies’ subject to conditions. “The applicants shall be escorted by a team of police officials. The officers shall be in plain clothes,” the bench said.

The court said the police officials shall lodge the applicants back in Tihar jail after the four-week period is over. It recorded Sahara counsel Kapil Sibal’s assurance that there would not be any “attempt to escape”.

Roy’s release comes a day after the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) opposed his application for parole against the collateral of land worth over Rs 6,000 crore. Roy, Roy Choudhary and Ravi Shankar Dubey were jailed for not complying with the apex court’s orders relating to refund of the money raised by two group firms. The court had ordered Sahara India Real Estate Corp and Sahara Housing Invest Corp to deposit  Rs 24,029 crore raised from some 29.6 million bondholders along with interest of 15 per cent.

Roy and the group claimed these had been refunded directly to the bondholders. Sebi and the court insisted the full payment of the sum, which has now swelled to about Rs 40,000 crore. In March 2014, the apex court had set bail conditions of Rs 5,000 crore in cash and an equal amount in bank guarantee. Sahara is Rs 100 crore short of the cash component and has not been able to come up with the bank guarantee.

In the earlier application for parole, it wanted the 67 properties, which have been put on sale by Sebi, to be taken as collateral instead of bank guarantee. In an affidavit on Thursday, Sebi said Roy should be released only after the conditions of the bail were complied with. It said Sahara was "likely to once again adopt an uncooperative attitude to delay the satisfaction of the judgment and various orders passed by this court."

Lastmonth, Sebi has directed Sahara to submit the list of all its properties, which, according to the group's own estimates are worth over Rs 1.87 lakh crore. The matter was scheduled to be heard on May 11.