Court dismisses anticipatory bail plea of couple

A Delhi court today refused to entertain an anticipatory bail plea of an Australia-based couple in a case lodged for various offences including allegedly trespassing into the office of Oswal Agro Mills Ltd here.
Dismissing the plea, the court said there was no apprehension of their arrest in India as they were presently in Australia where a court has prohibited them from leaving that country.
Pankaj Oswal and his wife Radhika Oswal had approached the court seeking anticipatory bail in an FIR filed by an official of Oswal Agro Mills Ltd on April 4 against them and some of their associates.

The FIR alleged that Oswals had occupied the office of the company without any authorisation from the board of directors and searched the company's cheque books and other documents, many of which were confidential and commercially sensitive.
Additional Sessions Judge Rakesh Pandit termed the bail plea as "dismissed as withdrawn" after observing that anticipatory bail could not be granted on technical grounds as "departure prohibitory orders" have been issued by Australian courts against the accused and hence, there was no apprehension of their arrest here.
Abhay Kumar Oswal, father of Pankaj, was a director and chairperson of board of directors of the company till his death in March this year. Later, Pankaj allegedly entered the premises of the firm, the FIR said.

The FIR alleged that the accused had forcefully occupied the office of the company without any authorisation from company's board of directors and searched company's cheque books and other documents.

They later went away with several of the company's confidential and other documents, the FIR said.
The FIR was filed under the sections of 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 380 (theft) and 452 (house trespass) of IPC.
The company was represented by senior advocate Mohit Mathur and lawyer Bharat Arora, who opposed the bail plea.