Hyderabad HC dismisses Puneet Dalmia’s plea seeking exemption from appearance in Jagan case

HYDERABAD: In a setback to Puneet Dalmia of Dalmia Cements, the Hyderabad High Court has recently dismissed his petition seeking exemption from his personal appearance before the special CBI court in the illegal assets case of YSR Congress chief YS Jaganmohan Reddy. 

“The petitioner, Puneet Dalmia (accused number three in Jagan’s assets case), and the other accused for one reason or other are causing hurdles to the court from proceeding further. If the delay is on the part of the Court, there is some justification to lament the court for non-disposal of the case. But, when the delay is attributable to the petitioner/accused in all the cases, the petitioner by taking advantage of such delay cannot claim exemption of his appearance who involved in serious and grave financial fraud which dent the financial health of the entire country,” the Court observed.

Justice M Satyanarayana Murthy was dismissing the petition filed by Puneet Dalmia seeking direction to the special CBI court not to insist on his presence at each date of hearing of the illegal assets case of Jagan.

The petitioner’s counsel contended that appearance of his client before the lower court would not serve any purpose as several petitions were pending for adjudication before the Court.In fact, insisting the petitioner appear on every date of adjournment was nothing but causing inconvenience to him and it affects his business activities as he is the director of various companies.  

The special public prosecutor for CBI submitted that the appearance of the petitioner cannot be dispensed with in view of the order passed by the High Court earlier in the petition filed by accused number one (Jagan), and urged to dismiss the present petition.

Justice Murthy said that the attributions against the petitioner were serious in nature i.e. bribing the A1 (Jagan) and his father (the then Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy) allegedly for transferring mining licence by corrupt practices and the total amount allegedly bribed was `20 crores, later `70 crores and so on, and the total amount was about `139 crores so as to establish the cement factory in AP. While dismissing the petition, the judge granted liberty to the petitioner to file a petition under Section 317 of CrPC before the lower court if he was unable to appear before the Court on every date of adjournment.