NEW DELHI: A Delhi court has dismissed real estate barons Sushil and Gopal Ansal’s interim plea seeking suspension of seven-year jail term sentence for tampering with evidence in the 1997 Uphaar fire tragedy case. The court said that suspending the sentence at this juncture will shake public confidence in the judicial system.
While dismissing the application, Additional Sessions Judge Anil Antil said that suspending the sentence at this stage will also go against the principles of criminal law. “The crime involved in the case is of a very grave nature. Suspending sentence at this stage will not only be against the established principles of criminal law but shake the confidence of general public in the judicial system. It is trite to say that if the judiciary as institution began to lose confidence of the public, our cherished value of democracy shall come under serious threat,” said the court order.
The Ansal brothers were handed seven years of imprisonment by a court for tampering with evidence in the 1997 Uphaar fire tragedy case which had claimed 59 lives. The court had also imposed a fine of Rs 2.25 crore each on the Ansals. The case is related to tampering with evidence in the main fire tragedy case, in which the Ansals were convicted and sentenced to a two-year jail term by the Supreme Court.
The apex court had, however, released the Ansals taking into account the prison time they had served on the condition that they pay a fine of Rs 30 crore each, to be used for building a trauma centre in the capital.
Challenging the conviction in an evidence tampering case where they got seven-year jail term by a magisterial court, the Ansal brothers had filed an appeal. Besides challenging their conviction and punishment, the Ansals had urged the sessions court to suspend their jail terms till the appeal is decided upon.