Hiten gets 7 years RI in scam cases

MUMBAI, MAR 16: The special court of Justice M S Rane, hearing the cases related to the 1992 securities scam, today sentenced stock broke...

MUMBAI, MAR 16: The special court of Justice M S Rane, hearing the cases related to the 1992 securities scam, today sentenced stock broker Hiten Dalal to seven years of rigorous imprisonment RI on three counts of the five counts on which he was convicted last week in the Canfina case. Since all the sentences will run concurrently, Dalal stands to serve seven years RI in this one case.

The others sentenced include M K Ashok Kumar, executive vice president and S Mohan, assistant vice president of Canfina. The two are sentenced to seven years of RI each for offences under Section 409 of IPC also, and a further two years8217; RI each for offences under Section 13 i d read with section 13 2 of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Stock broker Abhay Narottam, an agent of Bank of Karad, C S Raje, clerk of bank of Karad, S A Ail, executive chairman of MCB L K Kapadia, accountant of the MCB, M S Kushte and another stock broker S N Ramaswamy were also sentenced to RI. While all the accused sentenced today were foundguilty on the charge of conspiracy and section 409 of the IPC criminal breach of trust, Hiten Dalal, A D Narottam, Raje, Ail, Kapadia, Kushte and Ramaswamy were sentenced to another seven years for forgery of documents.

This is the third conviction of Hiten Dalal in the scam cases, the two earlier ones being awarded by the special court of Justice S N Variava. The other eight accused in the case involving a loss of Rs 374 crore to Canfina are also awarded various sentences, the minimum being seven years8217; RI. Those sentences are also to run concurrently.

Various amounts of fine were imposed with the sentences, and are to be paid till March 30.

Three of the total 12 accused were acquitted when the court passed its order on March 11. The court heard all those convicted on quantum of sentence today.

Justice Rane suspended the sentence for a period of four weeks to enable the accused to appeal to the Supreme Court. Earlier, CBI8217;s senior counsel Vijay Pradhan argued at length urging the court not tosuspend the sentence, and allow the accused to evade 8220;the long arm of the law for another five years or so.8221;

The two were accused of having conspired with the stock brokers, Hiten Dalal and Abhay Narottam to have received Bankers8217; Receipts BRs from the Bank of Karad BoK which were not backed by securities. Of the total amount of BRs worth Rs 494 cr, Bank of Karad paid Rs 121 cr. When the Rs 374 crore was clearly found to be unrecoverable, the Metropolitan Cooperative Bank stepped in, showing that it had issued three BRs to BoK. These obviously were fake, since MCB neither had the securities nor was it allowed to deal in them.

Story continues below this ad

Dalal, Narottam and Ramaswamy have got another two years RI for offences under section 411 of the IPC.