NEW DELHI: Congress leader Shashi Tharoor was granted anticipatory bail by a Delhi court on Thursday, with conditions that the leader deposit Rs 1 lakh and that he cannot travel abroad without permission of the court.
Tharoor has been granted protection from arrest in the case of his wife Sunanda Pushkar's death. The court had last month said there were "sufficient grounds" to proceed against him on charges of cruelty and abetting suicide. Delhi police in their charge sheet had named Tharoor as an accused.
Sunanda Pushkar, 51, was found dead in her suite at a five-star hotel in Delhi on January 17, 2014, two days after accusing her husband on social media of having an affair with a Pakistani journalist.
Tharoor will appear in court on Saturday before the court of Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Samar Vishal in the matter. Earlier Chief Metropolitan Magistrate had summoned him following filing of a charge sheet against the Congress leader last month by Delhi police. "I have perused the charge sheet [police report under Section 173 of the Cr.PC and documents filed along with it by the Special Investigation Team.
On the basis of the police report, I take cognisance of the offence of abetment of suicide under Section 306 of the IPC of late Ms. Sunanda Pushkar and of committing cruelty upon her, punishable under Section 498A of the IPC, by Dr. Shashi Tharoor," said the judge while summoning Tharoor earlier.
Senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Manu Singhvi appearing on behalf of Tharoor argued that if an accused was not arrested during investigation, no occasion arose for his or her arrest after filing of the charge sheet as in this case.