Kamala Mills fire: bail for managers, jail for owners

Mumbai: A sessions court on Wednesday granted bail to managers of 1Above, accused in the Kamala Mills fire incident. However, the court rejected the bail pleas of owners of 1Above, both the owners of Mojo’s Bistro and two others.

Lisbon Lopez, and Kevin Bawa, arrested on January 1 immediately after the incident, were in police custody for 10 days and then judicial custody for seven days. The court held that the managers did not indulge in illegal activity. Additional Sessions Judge S.V. Yarlagadda however, rejected the bail of 1Above co-owners, Kripesh and Jigar Sanghvi, and Abhijit Mankar. The court also rejected the bail application of Mojo’s Bistro co-owner Yug Pathak, Kamala Mills compound owner Ramesh Govani, and Kamala Mills director Ravi Bhandari.

On April 1, Judge A.L. Yawalkar had rejected the bail plea of Yug Tulli, co-owner of Mojo’s Bistro. Mr Tulli had to surrender before the court after his anticipatory bail had got rejected.

Till now, Vishal Kariya, associated with the 1Above owners and Utkarsh Pandey, the owner of Nirvana, that supplied hookah to Mojo’s Bistro, have been granted bail. All the accused have been booked for culpable homicide not amounting to murder following the fire on December 29 last year in which 14 people died.

Special public prosecutor Prakash Shetty had opposed bail pleas after relying upon the fire report, the report by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation and the investigation report by the police.