Allotment of houses to political parties delayed

“As the 11th Lok Sabha stands dissolved and the committees of the Lok Sabha are no longer in existence, it is understood that the matter is likely to take some time before the recommendations are made available,” the standing counsel submitted before the court.

“After the receipt of the advice of the Speaker, Lok Sabha, and the vice-chairman, Rajya Sabha, the matter will be placed before the Cabinet Committee on accommodation for a decision,” he said.

Meanwhile, political parties continue to occupy prime government properties in the Capital as the revised policy detailing the criteria for allotment of houses to parties is yet to be formulated.

As many as 40 government houses are occupied by political parties at present, with the Congress occupying 16 flats/bungalows, the Directorate of Estates said.

The other parties which occupy government accommodations are the BJP (3), the Janata Party (4), the CPI (3), the CPI(M) (2), the AIADMK (2), the Janata Dal (2) and the Samajwadi Janata Party (2). The parties which were allotted one accommodation each are the United Front, the Samata Party, the Samajwadi Party and the BSP, it said.

As per the Directorate’s reply, even defunct parties like the Lok Dal (A) and the Lok Dal (B) are occupying one government accommodation each.

The Supreme Court, which had heard a case pertaining to occupation of government accommodation by parties, had said in its order that after the policy “is framed, the political parties, which would be in occupation of greater number of units or would not be eligible as per the revised policy, would be given reasonable time to vacate the accommodation under their occupation.”

The court had taken suo motu cognisance of the matter relating to the “alleged arbitrary” allotment of houses to political parties and had sought assistance from advocate Jaya Jaitley and Nity Ramakrishna.

Malta case order put on hold

Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Prem Kumar on Tuesday reserved his orders for framing of charges against the 25 accused in the Malta boat tragedy case.The orders shall be pronounced on March 4 after conclusion of arguments on March 2 and 3 respectively. The court also directed CBI counsel V.S. Shukla to submit on February 2 certain deficient copies of documents required by the counsel, P.D. Sharma, for the accused, Jag Parvesh Kausal, a former assistant commissioner of police.

Meanwhile, a separate charge-sheet was filed against Jatinder Singh Chauhan, since his name did not figure in the first charge-sheet. He is in police custody since January 24. His bail application filed on Tuesday will be considered on Wednesday.

The application filed by the family of two more victims were forwarded to the CBI to issue arrest warrants against Tarsem Singh and Sohan Singh who are still at large and are allegedly involved in the racket.

CBI investigating officer R. Singh, in his report, submitted that the Ministry of External Affairs has provided the list of 109 missing persons. The court directed Singh to investigate in this regard and submit the report by February 2.

Plea to summon Mukhia reserved

A Delhi court on Tuesday reserved its judgment on a CBI plea seeking the summoning of a key witness, Devinder Mukhia, for further cross-examination in the multi-crore Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) MPs bribery case in the light of an affidavit filed by him in the Delhi High Court in July last year.Mukhia had alleged that he was threatened by then Bureau Director Joginder Singh to retract his statement. Special judge Ajit Bharihoke reserved the judgment after hearing the arguments of CBI Counsel A.K. Dutt and Defense Counsel H.R. Bharadwaj, appearing for former petroleum minister Capt. Satish Sharma, on Tuesday and on December nine respectively.

Bharadwaj opposed the application on the grounds that it was “misconceived” as there was no evidential value of the affidavit.

The CBI filed the application after Mukhia disowned his statement purportedly given to the CBI on January 7 about the conspiracy and subsequent payment of bribe to defeat the 1993 no-confidence motion against the P.V. Narasimha Rao government.