BJP MP Subramanian Swamy Seeks Summoning of Documents, Witnesses in National Herald Case

BJP MP Subramanian Swamy on Saturday moved a Delhi court seeking summoning of various documents and witnesses in the National Herald case filed by him against Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and others. The application moved by Swamy sought summoning of secretary general (registry officer) Supreme Court Sanjeev S Kalgaonar, deputy land and development officer Rajnish Kumar Jha, deputy commissioner of Income Tax (circle-1) Saket Singh and a Congress functionary who issued a press statement on November 2, 2012.

The case was scheduled for the cross examination of the complainant, Swamy, as a part of pre-charge evidence. This case is a quintessential case of documentary evidence. Due to the fact that there are many documents that have been annexed to the Chief Examination of the Complainant, which are public documents, which have been marked; these are certified copies of these public documents," the application said.

"Due to the fact that these are marked documents, these documents need to be proved through the testimony of the appropriate witnesses. It is reiterated that as the complainant's case is a quintessential case of the evidence being documentary evidence, therefore these documents need to be proved through their witnesses, it said. Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Ravinder Kumar Pandey on Saturday adjourned the matter for December 23 as the lawyers from the accused side did not appear physically and sought an adjournment.

Earlier, the court had asked both the parties to explore the solution for proceeding with the matter in view of the COVID-19 situation. Swamy, in a private criminal complaint, has accused the Gandhis and others of conspiring to cheat and misappropriate funds by paying just Rs 50 lakh, through which the Young Indian (YI) Private Limited obtained the right to recover the Rs 90.25 crore the Associated Journals Limited (AJL), the publisher of National Herald newspaper, owed to the Congress. All the seven accused in the case — Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, senior Congress leaders Motilal Vora, Oscar Fernandes, Suman Dubey and Sam Pitroda and Young Indian — have denied the allegations levelled against them. The Gandhis, Vora, Fernandes, Dubey and Pitroda are accused of misappropriation of property, criminal breach of trust, cheating and criminal conspiracy.

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