Syndicate Bank bribery case: Court grants bail to S K Jain and Neeraj Singal

NEW DELHI: A Delhi court today granted bail to two persons, who were arrested along with Syndicate Bank's suspended CMD S K Jain and Bhushan Steel Ltd Vice Chairman and Managing Director Neeraj Singal in a bribery case.

Special CBI Judge Swarana Kanta Sharma enlarged on bail Arun Kumar Aggarwal, an employee of Bhushan Steel Ltd, and alleged middleman Vikas Pahuja on furnishing of a personal bond each of Rs two lakh and a surety of the like amount.

Meanwhile, the court extended the judicial custody of other arrested accused till tomorrow.

The court had on September 27 granted bail to Singal, CMD of Prakash Industries Limited Ved Prakash Agarwal and co-accused Pankaj Bansal.

It had imposed several conditions on them including not to tamper with evidence and not to delay the ongoing proceedings in the case.

Jain, Singal, Ved Prakash Agarwal, Pankaj Bansal, alleged middleman Purshottam Totlani, Arun Kumar Aggarwal, Vishal Pahuja and others were arrested by CBI in connection with the case.

Singal was arrested by CBI on August 7, hours after the court had issued a non-bailable warrant against him and Totlani.

They were apprehended in connection with two separate graft cases in which CBI had booked them under the Prevention of Corruption Act and for the charge of criminal conspiracy under IPC.

On August 2, CBI had arrested some of the accused in connection with the case and claimed to have recovered Rs 21 lakh in cash from Jain's residence besides gold worth Rs 1.68 crore and documents of fixed deposits of up to Rs 63 lakh.

The agency has filed two cases against Jain, accusing him of receiving a bribe of Rs 50 lakh through conduits and abusing his official position to enhance the credit limits of some companies in violation of laid-down procedures.