Zeenews Bureau
New Delhi: A Delhi court on Friday granted bail to senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh in a criminal defamation case lodged against him by BJP president Nitin Gadkari.
Singh appeared before Metropolitan Magistrate Sudesh Kumar in pursuance to the summons issued against him by the court on November 17 and the judge granted bail to him on a personal bond of Rs 50,000 and a surety of the like amount.
The Congress leader, who was present in the court, sought a copy of the CD produced as evidence against him.
The matter would be heard next on January 31, 2013.
Outside the court, Singh told reporters that he will now prove all his charges against Gadkari.
"Now I can say everything in front of the court the way Gadkari has worked as a businessman and how he has links with various other businessmen, which all companies of his were fake and how he earned profits," he said.
The court after finding "prima facie" evidence against Singh had directed him to appear before it to face trial for the offence punishable under section 499 (defamation) and 500 (punishment for defamation) of the IPC.
Gadkari had filed the criminal defamation case against Singh, who had accused him of having business links with his party MP Ajay Sancheti who allegedly pocketed a huge sum in the coal block allocation.
Gadkari, in his statement recorded earlier in the court, had denied having any business ties with Sancheti and had said Singh had levelled "totally false and defamatory" allegations against him to "give the impression that I have been responsible for allocation of coal mines" to Sancheti.
In his complaint, Gadkari had said the Congress-led UPA government is facing a lot of heat on account of its irregularities as brought out by the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) in coal blocks allocation and accused Singh of making baseless allegations against him to divert attention from the issue.
(With PTI inputs)
