NEW DELHI:The Supreme Court on Friday denied interim relief to INLD leader Ajay Chautala, who, along with his father O P Chautala and three others, is serving a 10-year jail term in the teachers’ recruitment scam case. “We are not inclined to entertain your (Chautala) appeal at this stage. Sorry we cannot interfere in the judgment at this stage,” a Bench of Justices Fakkir Mohamed Ibrahim Kalifulla and Shiva Kirti Singh said. The Bench, which refused to suspend the sentence and grant bail to Chautala, however, asked him to file an appropriate plea for interim bail or parole on medical grounds.
“Whatever medical assistance you require during your stay in jail, you can file an appropriate application and seek relief,” the court said, adding, “you approach for parole on medical grounds”.
The hour-long hearing gave jitters to the convict and his lawyer, as the Bench once observed that it would not interfere with the Delhi High Court’s verdict in the case.
Senior advocate Gopal Subramanium, appearing for the INLD leader, persuaded the Bench to hear the plea on merits in July.
The Delhi HC had on March 5 upheld the 10-year jail term awarded to former Haryana Chief Minister O P Chautala, his son Ajay and three others, saying, “the overwhelming evidence showed the shocking and spine-chilling state of affairs in the country.”
The Chautalas and 53 others, including two IAS officers were convicted on January 16, 2013 by the trial court for illegally recruiting 3,206 junior basic trained (JBT) teachers in Haryana in 2000.
All the 55 convicts have been convicted and sentenced under Sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 418 (cheating), 467 (forgery), 471 (using forged documents as genuine) of the IPC and provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
The HC had modified the trial court’s order on the quantum of sentence and awarded a two-year jail term to the 50 others convicted in the case.