By IANS,
New Delhi : A Delhi court Wednesday extended till Oct 31 the interim bail of Govind Kanda, brother of former Haryana minister Gopal Goyal Kanda and an accused in the Geetika Sharma suicide, for ignoring warrants in a 14-year-old dud cheque matter.
District Judge H.S. Sharma extended Govind Kanda’s interim bail that was granted Sep 10 on a personal bond of Rs.10,000 and a surety of the same amount.
On the direction of a court, Gopal Kanda and his brother Govind, were declared proclaimed offenders for ignoring the warrants in the cheque-bounce case, which they settled out of court.
Police registered a case against the two brothers for avoiding the court’s warrants.
Earlier directing the registration of case against the Kanda brothers, another court said that evading court summons and warrants was different from cheque-bounce case and acquittal in one case did not absolve anyone of the second offence.
“The offence under section 174 A (proclaimed offender) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and section 138 of the Negotiable Instruments (NI) Act (cheque-bounce case) are two distinct offences. The acquittal of the accused in the compoundable offence under section 138… does not bar investigation into the offence under section 174 A IPC,” said Metropolitan Magistrate Vikrant Vaid.
Both the brothers faced summons and then warrants by the Delhi court over the 1998 case when a Rs.4 lakh cheque issued by Gopal Kanda had bounced. But the two failed to appear before it.
In May this year, the court declared both the brothers proclaimed offenders for not heeding its repeated summons and warrants to appear before it.
Gopal Kanda is in judicial custody for allegedly abetting the suicide of 23-year-old former flight attendant Geetika, who worked in his now-defunct MDLR Airlines.
Geetika committed suicide on the night of Aug 4-5 at her house in New Delhi. In her suicide note, she accused Gopal Kanda of harassing her and forcing her to commit suicide but he has denied the allegation.
Kanda had resigned as Harayna’s minister of state for home after he was charged with abetting the suicide of Geetika. Govind Kanda was arrested Aug 18 for helping Gopal Kanda evade arrest in the suicide case but was granted bail the same day by another Delhi court.