Updated by admin on
Friday, October 17, 2014 01:41 PM IST
New Delhi:
New Delhi: The Supreme Court granted former Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa a Diwali bonanza by freeing her on interim bail and suspending the conviction of the Bengaluru special court of a four-year jail term. Jayalalithaa will leave Bengaluru prison shortly and reach Chennai on Oct 18, along with her close aides Sasikala, V N Sudhagaran and J Ilavarasi, who were also granted bail.
Jayalalithaa and her aides were convicted to a four-year jail term on September 27, 2014, following which they filed an appeal before the Karnataka High Court, which rejected the bail petitions, stating that corruption was a violation of human rights and deserved to be put down.
They then moved the Supreme Court for bail which had adjourned the hearing to October 17, 2014.
The Supreme Court, however, warned that there should be no disturbance to maintenance of law and order in Tamil Nadu. It appeared that the bail had been granted mainly on health grounds.
Turning down the submission of lawyers representing Jayalalithaa for an immediate hearing on the bail petition, the Supreme Court had fixed Friday as the date for the hearing. Jayalalithaa's stint in prison from September 27 has ended for the time being.
BJP leader Subramanian Swamy said the SC had fixed conditions like she must be confined to her house in Chennai till December 18 by which time she and three others must file their paperwork for the appeal before the Karnataka HC to the apex court. A delay by even a day will mean that she and the others will be back in prison, Swamy said quoting the apex court judges. Swamy said the issue on which the SC granted bail was that the Karnataka HC had not yet decided whether the sentence should be suspended or not.
Jayalalithaa was convicted by a special court to a four-year jail term and fine of Rs 100 crore under the Prevention of Corruption Act, while the other three were sentenced to four-year jail-terms and a fine of Rs10 crore each.
Jayalalithaa, in her plea, has said she was a 66-year-old woman with ailments and pointed out that her appeal before the Karnataka High Court would not be decided for the next four years at least. As a result of the conviction, Jayalalithaa was automatically disqualified as an MLA and lost her post of Chief Minister.
She was lodged at the Parappana Agrahara prison in Bengaluru on September 27, 2014.
Jayalalithaa had urged the Supreme Court to provide an urgent hearing on her plea during the mentioning hour on October 10.
Jayalalithaa has pleaded that she has been sentenced only for four years in the case. She has also stated that she is also suffering from various ailments. She maintained that as Chief Minister she did not misuse her powers in this case. She also cited grounds of being a senior citizen and a woman for the bail plea.
The Special Public Prosecutor, in the Karnataka HC, had not objected to grant of conditional bail to her.
In her petitions seeking immediate bail, Jayalalithaa stated that the charge against her of amassing wealth during 1991—96, when she was the Chief Minister, was false and maintained that she had acquired property through legal means.
She also said that the trial court had overlooked several judgments and not considered the binding nature of various income tax orders and decisions of the Income Tax Appellate Tribunal, which had accepted the income and the level of expenditure pleaded by her.
Justice A V Chandrashekara of the Karnataka High Court, who passed the interim order rejecting her bail plea, said there were "no grounds" to grant her relief. Corruption amounts to “violation of human rights” and leads to economic imbalance, the High Court judge had observed.
