The Delhi High Court on Tuesday asked the Delhi Police to file a status report on a petition challenging the anticipatory bail granted to Congress MP Shashi Tharoor last month in connection with the 2014 death of his wife, PTI reported.
The plea was filed by a Delhi-based lawyer Deepak Anand, who contended that the bail was granted “erroneously”. Anand said that after the chargesheet was filed, the trial court had taken cognisance of the issue and issued summons to Tharoor. But the Congress leader did not appear before the court and instead moved the court of an additional sessions judge, who “erroneously” granted him bail, the petitioner said.
Pushkar was found dead at a suite in the Leela Palace Hotel in New Delhi on January 17, 2014. Tharoor has been charged under Sections 498A (a husband or his relative subjecting a woman to cruelty) and 306 (abetment of suicide) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), but has not been arrested. Tharoor has claimed the charges against him were “preposterous and baseless” and a product of a “malicious and vindictive campaign”.
Listing the matter for further hearing on September 25, Justice RK Gauba asked the Delhi Police’s standing counsel (criminal) Rahul Mehra to appear before it. “The state shall file a status report inspecting the case against the backdrop of which the present controversy is raised,” it said.
On Monday, a court in Delhi’s Patiala House Courts complex allowed Tharoor to travel to Geneva in Switzerland to express condolences to the family of former United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, who passed away on Saturday. Tharoor also planned to seek international aid for Kerala, which is reeling from its worst floods in close to a century.
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