Nirmal Yadav case: arguments on framing of charges on March 21

A CBI court here today fixed March 21 for arguments on framing of charges in a bribery case involving retired Punjab and Haryana High Court judge Nirmal Yadav.

Yadav was granted permission from personal exemption today by CBI Judge Vimal Kumar due to "backache".

The prosecuting agency sought time to file reply on an application moved by one of the accused Sanjeev Bansal that no case was made out against him.

Bansal sought from the court that he should be dischraged as no case was made against him, defence counsel Vishal Garg Narwana contended.

The CBI sought time to respond to the application moved by the defence.
CBI special prosecutor Anupam Gupta told the court that evidence in the case was sufficient for framing of charges against the accused.

In August 2008, an amount of Rs 15 lakh was delivered at the house of Justice Nirmaljit Kaur in Chandigarh. The matter was reported to the police.

It was stated that the money was actually meant for Justice Nirmal Yadav, which had been sent by Delhi-based hotelier Ravinder Singh Bhasin and had been delivered at the wrong address. The investigation of the case was later handed over to the CBI.

The charge sheet was filed against her by the CBI, a day after Yadav, then posted as a judge of the Uttarakhand High Court, retired.
Earlier, the CBI had filed closure report in the case on the ground that prosecution sanction had been declined, but the special CBI judge had refused to accept the report.

On being approached again by the CBI, the President had granted sanction for prosecution on March 1 last year.

On August 27 last, Yadav had appeared for the first time before the CBI special court hearing the case and was granted bail after furnishing a bond of Rs 25,000.
The others include in the case are advocate Sanjeev Bansal, Delhi-based hotelier Ravinder Singh Bhasin, Chandigarh-based businessman Rajiv Gupta and Nirmal Singh.