Delhi Assembly Speaker Ram Niwas Goel sentenced to six months in jail for house trespass, assault

NEW DELHI: Delhi Assembly Speaker Ram Niwas Goel was on Friday sentenced to six months jail by Delhi's Rouse Avenue court for rioting and causing hurt at the house of a realtor in an East Delhi colony in 2015. Son of Ram, Sumit Goel has also been sentenced for six months in prison along with a fine for Rs 1,000 each for trespassing into someone's private property.

Earlier in October, Goel was convicted under Section 448 of the India Penal Code (IPC) for house-trespass by the Rouse Avenue Court. Section 448 carries a maximum punishment of up to one year, meaning that Goel is safe from disqualification. Besides Goeland his son, four other people have been convicted in the case and all of them have been given a sentence of 6-month imprisonment. 

The case pertains to an incident on February 6, 2015 when AAP’s Shahdara MLA Goel and his supporters had allegedly raided one of the houses of a local builder in Delhi's Vivek Vihar. Manish Ghai, the builder, had alleged in the FIR that Goel raided his property accusing him of stashing liquor, blankets and other stuff for distribution ahead of the assembly polls. The builder alleged that several items including almirah, drawers, window panes, and mirrors in the house were broken. He alleged that labourers who were staying at the house at the time of the incident were physically assaulted by AAP leaders. 

The chargesheet, filed before a chief metropolitan magistrate in September 2017, had named seven persons as accused in the case accusing them of rioting, trespassing, causing mischief and voluntarily causing hurt. Goel had denied allegations, saying that they had first made a call to PCR with complaints regarding the same. The AAP leaders said that they had gone to Ghai's house with a police team. 

(With inputs from Pramod Sharma and Nivriti Mohan)