Hon’ble Court grants bail to the two corporate leaders, sets aside prosecution’s protests, and orders that passports be returned
Zee News Ltd warns against multiple “forum shopping” on one single complaint by Naveen Jindal
New Delhi: The Hon’ble Additional Sessions Judge, Delhi District Court, Saket , Smt. Raj Rani Mitra on Thursday quashed the Public Prosecutors’ plea that bail to Zee Non Executive Chairman, Mr. Subhash Chandra and Zee Managing Director, Mr. Puneet Goenka, be denied. The hon’ble judge did not find substance in the Public Prosecutors’ plea of arresting the two individuals in connection with this case.
The Hon’ble Court ordered the Delhi Police to provide a 10 day prior notice to the two corporate leaders before any custody can be requested for Mr. Chandra and Mr. Goenka, if at all they were so require in future. On an earlier occasion, the police had summoned the two to be present at a notice of less than three hours!
The court also ordered Delhi Police to return the passports of Mr Chandra and Mr Goenka. The passports had been duly deposited in deference to the Hon’ble Court.
Zee News Ltd states that the current case and the earlier arrests were unwarranted, illegal and an attack on the freedom of the press. The evidence of this malafide includes “forum shopping” by Mr Jindal where he has posed the same complaint before multiple fora, viz, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, the Press Council of India, the News Broadcasting Standards Authority, the Broadcast Editors Association and the Hon’ble Bombay High Court.
Mr. Subhash Chandra`s counsel Vijay Aggarwal said Thursday: “Our stand has been vindicated and Delhi police could not answer our argument as to why my clients are required to be arrested.”
Zee News Ltd reiterates that the present case has been registered on the basis of a false and frivolous complaint filed at the behest of M/s Jindal Steel and Power. Material and evidence was telecast at Zee News Channel against the complainant, in retaliation of which officials of the complainant company approached and the met Zee News Editors, offering bribes and inducements to stop the telecast against the complainant in the garb of an advertisement contract.
The case relates to a series of exposes in the CoalGate scam involving Congress MP and industrialist Naveen Jindal’s firm. In the case, the two Zee Editors had exposed Mr Jindal’s efforts to silence the Zee News’s coverage of Coalgate through the Rs 100 crore-advertisement contract.
Zee News Ltd is undeterred by such diversionary tactics adopted by Mr. Jindal and JSPL and is focused on unraveling the ultimate truth in the Coalgate scam.
