New Delhi, Feb 12: The Supreme Court on Thursday stayed the arrest of civil rights' activist Teesta Setalvad, her husband Javed Anand and three others in an alleged misappropriation case.
Earlier on Thursday, the Gujarat High Court refused to grant anticipatory bail to Ms. Setalvad, Mr. Anand and three residents of Gulbarg Society in the case.
A bench headed by Chief Justice H.L. Dattu agreed to hear Ms. Setalvad's anticipatory bail plea on Friday.
A Gujarat Crime Branch team had reached Ms. Setalvad's residence in suburban Mumbai after the High Court in Ahmedabad rejected her anticipatory bail application.
The case pertains to a First Information Report (FIR) registered by the Ahmedabad Crime Branch last January, which alleged that Ms. Setalvad, Mr. Anand, former MP Ehsan Jafri’s son Tanvir and two office bearers of the society -- Salimbhai Sandhi and Firoz Gulzar -- had embezzled funds to the tune of Rs. 1.5 crore meant for the construction of a memorial for riot victims.
The court, however, granted anticipatory bail to Tanvir Jafri, Salimbhai Sandhi and Firoz Gulzar.
“The money which should have gone to the poor and the needy appears to have been prima facie misused for their personal pleasure and comfort. Although in the course of lengthy arguments it was vehemently submitted that the applicants are ready and willing to cooperate with the investigation, yet I have noticed that there is no cooperation worth the name,” Justice JB Pardiwala observed in his order.
From the responses given by Ms. Setalvad and Mr. Anand to the questions posed to them by the police, the court said, that “there is no cooperation at all.”
“It is at that stage and in such circumstances that the custodial interrogation becomes very important.”
The court did not find any merit in the “serious allegations of malafides” levelled by the duo against the State.
As per the police case, the NGO, Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP), and the Sabrang Trust run by Ms. Setalvad and Mr. Anand, had embezzled the funds.
In a scathing indictment, Justice Pardiwala described the two organisations as “a one-woman and one-man show” and drove home the misuse of funds by NGOs.
“The facts of this case are quite shocking and disturbing. How can one seek materialistic pleasure and happiness at the expense of the poor and needy persons. The facts of this case reflect the sorry state of affairs of the NGOs. While giving freedom to the civil society to function with the flexibility is positive, too much freedom can lead to abuses by certain groups or individuals calling themselves an ‘NGO’, thus giving civil society a bad name. It is, therefore, very important to have strict laws regulating accountability and monitoring of the NGOs so as to maintain a high trust level and good functioning,” the order states.
While Ms. Setalvad and Mr. Anand were “well-renowned persons of great repute,” the “hard reality” could not be ignored, the court said.
Ms. Setalvad and Mr. Anand could not be reached for comment. The Crime Branch here denied reports of their arrest and said they were “absconding.”
Earlier post
Gujarati court rejects Teesta Setalvad's bail plea, arrest imminent
Mumbai/Ahmedabad, Feb 12: The Gujarati high court on Thursday rejected the anticipatory bail plea of social activist Teesta Setalvad in connection with a case on alleged misappropriation of trust funds collected on behalf of riot victims. The case was filed against her in Gujarat.
Justice Pardiwala said that since the accused were not co-operating properly in the investigation and because it prima facie appears that the funds were used for private purpose, the accused persons cannot be armoured with full-fledged anticipatory bail.
Setalvad's arrest is now imminent. Ahmedabad crime branch had already started searching for her. They have contacted Mumbai crime branch to locate her. Teesta was not at her Mumbai residence.
Teesta's lawyers refused to divulge her exact location soon after the court rejected her pre-arrest bail plea. But it was clear that she was unlikely to remain in Mumbai where her house is. She was likely to leave the city if she hadn't left already said sources.
The HC had earlier granted Teesta interim protection against arrest which it vacated on Thursday. The Bombay high court had earlier said it lacked the territorial jurisdiction to hear her plea wheh she first moved the HC in Mumbai last year. Teesta and her husband Javed Anand had moved the Bombay HC to quash the FIR in the misappropriation case against them. The Bombay HC had asked them to approach the court in Gujarat.
The Gujarat police filed a detailed 80-page reply last July to oppose Teesta's pre-arrest bail plea. The thrust of their argument is that she has used trust funds and monies collected by her NGO for personal use. Earlier while opposing her plea in the Bombay HC the Gujarat police said she "embezzled funds" collected in the name of the 2002 Godhra riot victims. Setalvad refuted the allegations and said she was being falsely and ''dishonestly'' implicated.
Setalvad and Anand had challenged before the Bombay HC an FIR filed against them by the Gujarat police last year.
Earlier the HC had asked her to file for anticipatory bail before a Gujarat sessions court which she did. The FIR against Teesta and Javed said that both the accused in the guise of collecting funds in the name of their NGO Sabrang Trust to set up a museum for victims of the 2002 communal riots in Gujarat at the site of Gulbarga housing society had allegedly misappropriated the funds and cheated the complainant. The FIR also invoked Section 72A of the Information Technology Act for disclosure in breach of lawful contract.
Teesta had earlier rebutted the police reply and said, "the state of Gujarat was spreading lies about Citizen for Justice and Peace cheating victims of the riots.
She had filed a rejoinder to respond to each "baseless and malicious allegation" of the state and she said a former employee of the Organisation who had filed the complaint was being used as a proxy. Sent from my iphone
Some former residents of the society alleged that Setalvad and her NGOs restrained them from disposing of their properties after the riots by promising them the NGOs would purchase them and turn them into a riot memorial.
However, the properties were never purchased on the ground that there was not enough fund. Later, the NGOs and the office bearers of the society told them that they could sell their houses. They have alleged that Setalvad and her NGOs gathered money from across the world by showing their condition and upon promise that the funds were meant for their upliftment.
On 28 February, 2002, sixty-nine persons including former MP Ehsan Jafri were killed by an unruly mob at Gulbarg Society.
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