M A I N   N E W S

Fodder scam: HC questions delay in sanction

Ranchi, August 4
A monitoring bench of the Jharkhand High Court has directed the Union Finance Secretary, Personnel Secretary, Lok Sabha Secretary General and Chief Secretaries of Jharkhand and Bihar to file affidavits explaining the reasons for the delay in granting sanction against the accused in the multi-crore fodder scam.

The bench comprising Chief Justice V.K. Gupta and Mr Justice S.J. Mulhopadhyay issued the direction while monitoring the progress of investigation of the fodder scam cases by the CBI yesterday, investigating agency sources said here today.

The CBI while submitting its status report to the high court pleaded that the “slow” progress of the investigations could be attributed to lack of sanction from the competent authorities in submitting charge sheets in as many as four cases of the fodder scam.

The court asked CBI counsel P.P.N. Roy to furnish the Jharkhand Advocate General M.M. Bannerjee, Bihar government counsel A. Alam and Union Government counsel P.K. Prasad with a list of those fodder scam accused, against whom sanction was still awaited, within a week.

The CBI also maintained that the “tardy” progress of the cases was partly a result of “non-cooperation” from the Accountant General’s (Jharkhand) office which was not furnishing original vouchers in a number of cases. PTI

Charges to be framed against Romesh Sharma

New Delhi, August 4
A Delhi court today ordered framing of charges against former Congress leader Romesh Sharma, an alleged front man of underworld don Dawood Ibrahim, in a Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FERA) violation case. Passing the order against Sharma, Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate V.K. Maheshwari fixed August 8 to formally frame the charges under Section 56 of FERA.

Sharma had allegedly exported shipping goods and received $ 3,45,195 illegally in 1997 through his company M/s Next One located in Delhi. UNI