Court summons Virbhadra, others in DA case

A court here on Monday issued summons for May 22 to Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, his wife Pratibha Singh and seven others in a disproportionate assets case.

Special Judge Virender Kumar Goyal issued the summons after considering the chargesheet filed in the case under offence of forgery of the Indian Penal Code and of criminal misconduct of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The court observed that during the period from May 28, 2009 to June 26, 2012, Virbhadra Singh, as Union Minister of Steel and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, committed criminal misconduct.

The court said the chargesheet found that the minister was in possession of disproportionate assets worth Rs 10,30,47,946.40 in his own name as well as in the names of his family members and failed to give a satisfactorily answer regarding the disproportionate assets.

Life Insurance Corp agent Anand Chauhan, his associate Chunni Lal, Joginder Singh Ghalta, Prem Raj, Lawan Kumar Roach, Vakamullah Chandrashekhar and Ram Prakash Bhatia are the other accused and summoned in the case.

In a 74-page order, the court noted that Virbhadra Singh's wife Pratibha and other eight accused abetted the offence by investing his money in the names of his wife, daughter, and son.

The CBI also alleged that co-accused Pratibha Singh intentionally and actively abated Virbhadra Singh in investing his ill-gotten and unaccounted money in her and their children's names, the court observed.

The CBI has accused the senior Congress leader of trying to justify the income as agricultural.

The CBI had booked the accused on charges of abetment to crime and forgery on September 23, 2015, after a preliminary inquiry found that Virbhadra Singh, as the Union Steel Minister from 2009 to 2012, allegedly accumulated assets worth Rs 10 crore, which were disproportionate to his known sources of income.

The court observed that the CBI, during investigation, have adequate opportunities to Virbhadra Singh but he failed to explain satisfactorily his assets.

The other accused allegedly tried to legitimise his disproportionate assets by creating false documents in the shape of a Memorandum of Understanding, sale proceeds and others.

The court noted that in order to legitimise his disproportionate assets, Virbhadra Singh engaged himself with co-accused Chauhan, Lal, Ghalta, Raj and Roach for making an ante-dated MoU dated June 15, 2008, for the management of Shrikhand Orchard, Damrali, which is owned by Virbhadra Singh.

The accused also allegedly created fake sale proceeds of Universal Apples Associates owned by Lal to camouflage the ill-gotten wealth and show that the income was generated through the sale of apples grown in Shrikhand Orchard.

While considering the chargesheet, the court noted that details of vehicles repeatedly used for transporting apples from the orchard to Universal Apple Associates were found to be either non-existent or belonged to two-wheelers and others vehicles not fit to ferry apples.

Chauhan was instrumental in depositing the unaccounted money in LIC policies, the agency alleged.

--IANS

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