Court summons Virbhadra, others in DA case

New Delhi, May 8: A court here on Monday issued summons for May 22 to Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, his wife Pratibha Singh and seven others in a disproportiote assets case.

Special Judge Virender Kumar Goyal issued the summons after considering the chargesheet filed in the case under offence of forgery of the Indian Pel Code and of crimil misconduct of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The court observed that during the period from May 28, 2009 to June 26, 2012, Virbhadra Singh, as Union Minister of Steel and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, committed crimil misconduct.

The court said the chargesheet found that the minister was in possession of disproportiote assets worth Rs 10,30,47,946.40 in his own me as well as in the mes of his family members and failed to give a satisfactorily answer regarding the disproportiote assets.

Life Insurance Corp agent And Chauhan, his associate Chunni Lal, Joginder Singh Ghalta, Prem Raj, Lawan Kumar Roach, Vakamullah Chandrashekhar and Ram Prakash Bhatia are the other accused and summoned in the case.

In a 74-page order, the court noted that Virbhadra Singh’s wife Pratibha and other eight accused abetted the offence by investing his money in the mes of his wife, daughter, and son.

The CBI also alleged that co-accused Pratibha Singh intentiolly and actively abated Virbhadra Singh in investing his ill-gotten and uccounted money in her and their children’s mes, the court observed.

The CBI has accused the senior Congress leader of trying to justify the income as agricultural.

The CBI had booked the accused on charges of abetment to crime and forgery on September 23, 2015, after a prelimiry inquiry found that Virbhadra Singh, as the Union Steel Minister from 2009 to 2012, allegedly accumulated assets worth Rs 10 crore, which were disproportiote to his known sources of income.

The court observed that the CBI, during investigation, have adequate opportunities to Virbhadra Singh but he failed to explain satisfactorily his assets.

The other accused allegedly tried to legitimise his disproportiote assets by creating false documents in the shape of a Memorandum of Understanding, sale proceeds and others.

The court noted that in order to legitimise his disproportiote assets, Virbhadra Singh engaged himself with co-accused Chauhan, Lal, Ghalta, Raj and Roach for making an ante-dated MoU dated June 15, 2008, for the magement of Shrikhand Orchard, Damrali, which is owned by Virbhadra Singh.

The accused also allegedly created fake sale proceeds of Universal Apples Associates owned by Lal to camouflage the ill-gotten wealth and show that the income was generated through the sale of apples grown in Shrikhand Orchard.

While considering the chargesheet, the court noted that details of vehicles repeatedly used for transporting apples from the orchard to Universal Apple Associates were found to be either non-existent or belonged to two-wheelers and others vehicles not fit to ferry apples.

Chauhan was instrumental in depositing the uccounted money in LIC policies, the agency alleged. (IANS)