Sahara says it can pay Rs 2,500 cr now for Roy's release, group stocks plunge 5%

The Sahara Group today expressed its inability before the Supreme Court to immediately pay Rs 10,000 crore for securing bail of its chief Subrata Roy and its two directors, who have been in jail since March 4.

Reacting to the development, Sahara stocks took a tumble on the Street.

Sahara One Media & Entertainment slipped 4.98% to Rs 65.85 in intraday trade on the BSE.

Similarly, Sahara Housingfina slipped 3.98% to Rs 47.

The group told a bench of justices K S Radhakrishnan and J S Khehar that it can pay Rs 2,500 crore immediately and rest Rs 2,500 crore in cash within three weeks after release of Roy and two directors, Ravi Shankar Dubey and Ashok Roy Choudhary.

The apex court had earlier imposed a condition that Roy will be freed on bail only if he pays Rs 10,000 crore out of which Rs 5,000 crore has to be in bank guarantee and rest Rs 5,000 crore in cash.

The court, however, asked Sahara to file its proposal before the Registry and then it will consider it.

The hearing will continue in post lunch session. Roy and the other two directors of the Group have been in judicial custody since March 4 for not abiding by the apex court's order for depositing Rs 20,000 crore of investors money with SEBI.

65-year-old Roy had earlier submitted that the apex court's order for detaining him for not paying Rs 20,000 of investors' money with SEBI was illegal and unconstitutional and sought quashing of the order.

A group of senior advocates headed by Ram Jethmalani, who had appeared for Roy and the company, had told the bench that its approach was "biased" and it should not hear the petition challenging the order.

The counsel had said it was unconstitutional to send a man behind bars for not paying the money and also questioned the order putting a condition of paying Rs 10,000 crore for getting interim bail.

SEBI, however, had opposed the stand taken by Roy's counsel, saying that his petition was not maintainable.

(With inputs from PTI)