NEW DELHI: In a major setback to 42-year-old Olympic medallist Sushil Kumar in the murder case of former junior national wrestling champion Sagar Dhankar, the SC on Wednesday cancelled his bail and ordered him to surrender within a week.
A two-judge bench of the apex court, headed by Justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra, set aside the March 4 order of the Delhi High Court granting bail to the wrestler. The court passed the order cancelling Kumar’s bail after going through the appeal of Dhankar’s uncle, Ashok Dhankad, who had challenged the decision of the Delhi HC in the Supreme Court.
According to the prosecution, Kumar, along with several others, is accused of assaulting Dhankar and his two friends in the parking lot of Delhi’s Chhatrasal Stadium in 2021, allegedly over a property dispute. Kumar, in his bail plea before the high court, sought bail on the ground that he had already spent three and a half years in jail. The high court, taking note of the prolonged incarceration and the slow pace of the trial, had granted him bail. The Delhi HC had earlier granted bail to Kumar after noting that in three years since the trial began, only 30 of the 186 prosecution witnesses had been examined, which was less than one-sixth of the total number.
Ashok Dhankad, in his appeal to the top court, alleged that Kumar had tried to intimidate witnesses in the case. He also claimed that during an earlier interim bail period, Kumar had threatened a key witness. The SC, after going through the appeal of Ashok Dhankad, cancelled the bail of Kumar.