National Herald case: Subramanian Swamy seeks summoning of financial details of INC

BJP leader Subramanian Swamy on Tuesday approached a court in New Delhi seeking summoning of certain documents related to the financial details of Indian National Congress (INC), Associated Journals Pvt Ltd and Young Indian Pvt Ltd for the purpose of investigation in the National Herald case.

In an application moved before Metropolitan Magistrate Lovleen, Swamy has sought to summon balance sheet, receipts, income and expenditure statements for assessment years 2010- 11, 2011-12 and 2012-13 of INC, Associated Journals Pvt Ltd (AJL) and Young Indian Pvt Ltd (YI).

Congress President Sonia Gandhi, her son Rahul Gandhi, Motilal Vora, Oscar Fernandes, Suman Dubey and Sam Pitroda are accused in the case.

Swamy had accused Sonia, Rahul and others of conspiring to cheat and misappropriate funds by just paying Rs 50 lakh by which YI obtained the right to recover Rs 90.25 crore which the AJL had owed to the Congress party.

In the application, which will be considered by the court on March 8, the complainant claimed that these documents were necessary for the interest of justice in the matter.

On February 20, the court had directed that some documents summoned from the Ministries of Finance, Urban Development and Corporate Affairs, Income Tax Department and other agencies in the case would be kept in a sealed cover till further orders, after noting that Delhi High Court was seized of the matter.

The direction had come after the accused in the case had argued that Swamy should first satisfy the court about the relevance of the documents which were ordered to be summoned.

The court had on December 19, 2015, granted bail to Sonia, Rahul, Vora, Fernandes and Dubey, who had appeared before it pursuant to the summons issued earlier. Pitroda was granted bail on February 20 when he had appeared in the court.

The Supreme Court had earlier granted exemption to Gandhis from personal appearance in the trial court.

Sonia, Rahul, Vora (AICC Treasurer), Fernandes (AICC General Secretary), Dubey and Pitroda were summoned for alleged offences under section 403 (dishonest misappropriation of property), 406 (criminal breach of trust) and 420(cheating) read with section 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC.