HC no to regular bail plea of former Punjab minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, October 17

The Punjab and Haryana High Court today dismissed former Congress minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu’s regular bail plea in a cheating, forgery and corruption case registered at the Vigilance Bureau police station in Ludhiana district.

Justice Raj Mohan Singh pronounced the orders in the open court after hearing lengthy arguments in the matter by his counsel and the state counsel. The bail plea was opposed by advocate Abhinav Gupta on the complainant’s behalf. The judgment’s copy was not yet available.

In his petition, Bhushan submitted the present case was nothing but abuse of the process of law. The only motive of the Vigilance Bureau, working under the present ruling government of the Aam Aadmi Party, was to publicly humiliate the petitioner, who was a Cabinet minister at the time when the Congress was in power in the state.

His counsel added that a set of allegations against the petitioner was that he tried to help certain contractors by changing a clause in the Punjab Food Grains Labour and Cartage Policy 2020-2021. Every year, the Punjab Food & Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs Department (Food Grains Procurement Branch) issued a policy for storage, labour and cartage policy to carry food grain to the godown up to 8 km from the grain market to the storage place.

The policies were drafted by a special committee consisting of the Secretary, Food Supply, Director Food Supply and other higher officials of the state. Therefore, the drafting of policies was not a one-man job, but was carried out by a group of experts, who verified and analysed each aspect, after which the final draft of the policy was formulated.

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