Delhi Court grants bail to five in auto permits corruption case

A Delhi court has granted bail to five people arrested in a case of corruption at the Burari Transport Authority here in which auto permits were allegedly transferred fraudulently and using forged documents, causing loss of revenue to the government.
Special Judge Jay Thareja noted that the probe agency was contemplating the examination of more than 5,000 transfer of permits at the Authority and that this exercise will take substantial time to complete.
Thus, the accused “cannot be kept in judicial custody for such a long time,” the court said while granting bail to the accused Anil Sethi, Ravinder Kumar, Anoop Sharma, Ajit Kumar, and Deepak Chawla on September 6.
The court noted they had spent sufficient time in custody since their arrest on June 29.
“I find the bail application of the accused is liable to be allowed… because a majority of the other accused, who are facing much graver allegations in contrast to the subject accused, have been granted bail,” the judge said.
The judge said “no useful purpose is likely to be served by keeping the accused in judicial custody”.
The judge, meanwhile, imposed various conditions on the accused persons, including that they will not go within 500 metres of the Burari Transport Authority without the advance permission of the court, not try to contact or influence, directly or indirectly, any of the witnesses in the present case, and shall not tamper with evidence.
The Anti-Corruption Branch of the Delhi Police had alleged that there was a cap on autorickshaw permits in Delhi, fixed at one lakh, and out of the that one lakh autorickshaw permits in Delhi, 70 per cent were being traded illegally on account of nexus among financiers and dealers of autorickshaws, touts, and officials of the Authority.