A day after the Delhi High Court issued temporary stay till August 13 in the National Herald case, New Delhi Metropolitan Magistrate Court on Thursday issued fresh summons to Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi to appear before it on August 28.
Hearing petitioner BJP leader Subramanian Swamy and Sonia Gandhi’s advocate Ramesh Gupta on the previous day’s developments in the Delhi High Court, Magistrate Gomati Manocha issued fresh dates for summoning the Congress leaders.Swamy told the court on the absence of one accused Sam Pitroda. Gupta, who appeared for Sonia, Rahul and others, told the court that summons have not been served on accused Sam Pitroda as he stays in the USA now. Responding to this, Swamy offered the court on serving summons to Pitroda. The court admitted his contention.
On June 26, trail court had issued summons to Sonia, Rahul and Congress leaders Motilal Vora, Oscar Fernadez and Gandhi family loyalists Suman Dubey and Pitroda to appear before it on August 7. While summoning the six as accused in the case, the trial court had held that Swamy has established a prima facie case of cheating, misappropriation of funds and criminal breach of trust against them.
Except Pitroda all the accused approached Delhi High Court for staying and quashing the proceedings of the trial court. The arguments were started on August 5, lead by battery of lawyers led by Kapil Sibal, Abhishek Singhvi. On Wednesday, citing the non-completion of the arguments, Justice VP Vaish had given temporary stay till August 13.In the trial court Swamy requested to start the proceeding by August 17 or 18. The lawyer of the accused pointed out that as Pitroda lives in USA, time should be given.
“Patriotic Tweeples, please put out a search for Sam Pitroda. He can contact me through a common friend in Trinamool Congress. I have to serve him the commons,” later Swamy Tweeted. Pitroda usually stays in the home of Trinamool Congress MP Dinesh Trivedi during his stays in Delhi for the past five years.