A Delhi-based journalist has approached the Supreme Court challenging the order of the Bombay High Court which gave a clean chit to Naresh Goyal of Jet Airways on his alleged link with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim after the Centre filed a report denying the allegations.

The petition would be heard by the apex court on October 26 as Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan refused to postpone it till Dipawali.

‘No adjournment’
When advocate Ankur Gupta prayed for adjournment as senior advocate Harish Salve representing Jet Airways was not in India, the court said it was not the ground to postpone a case.

The Bombay High Court recently dismissed the petition after the Union Home Ministry and intelligence agencies, including RAW, gave clean chit to Goyal on the question of alleged funding by the underworld don.
The Public Interest Litigation (PIL) was filed by M Furqan, an editor of a Urdu daily, based on an alleged Intelligence Bureau report saying Goyal had close links with Dawood and had even received funds from him.
Similar allegations were also made in the past but government inquiries found no evidence against the airline.
Jet has always denied any links with underworld groups.

The petition said the airline might be used for anti-national and anti-social activities if the illegal funding to it continued.

“The petitioner fears that the activities can go even to the extreme of explosion of flights in the model of the attack on the World Trade Centre in the US,” the petition said.

Jet, having nearly one-third of India’s booming domestic aviation market, also flies to London, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Colombo and Kathmandu.