Chidambaram case: Delhi LG revokes Home Ministry's decision
The case against Gupta was reportedly dropped on the directions from the Home Ministry. There was a conflict of interest in the dropping of the case as Home Minister P Chidambaram had earlier appeared as counsel for the hotelier.
New Delhi: Delhi Lieutenant Governor Tejendra Khanna on Thursday revoked the withdrawal of prosecution against hotelier SP Gupta, the owner of the five-star Metropolitan Hotel and Sunair Hotels company.
However, Home Secretary RK Singh said that Chidambaram had no role in the Hotel Metropolitan controversy. RK Singh told CNN-IBN that Chidambaram was unable to recall whether the hotelier was his client or not because of time gap.
"The Home minister, number one, specifically wrote on the file, that only the opinion of the law ministry and petition will be conveyed, number one. Number two, it is being said that that fellow was a client. Now, in govt I've had to interact with advocates, senior advocates, and I don't think that if you ask a senior advocate whether he represented somebody at some point of time 10 years or 20 years back he will actually remember," said Singh.
Since 1999, the owners of five star Metropolitan Hotel, SP Gupta and his company Sunair Hotels, have been involved in a series of bitter legal disputes with VLS Finance Ltd, a company which claims to have funded the project. P Chidambaram, then an opposition MP, represented Sunair Hotels in the High Court for one the disputes.
Even as the civil suits were being heard in courts, VLS Finance filed three FIRs in various Delhi Police stations against the owners of Metropolitan Hotel for defrauding them.
Things took an interesting turn when Chidambaram became the Home Minister after the 26/11 Mumbai attacks. Documents available with CNN-IBN show that the Home Ministry started actively working on representations sent by Sunair, asking for withdrawal of the criminal cases. Several letters were then sent by the ministry to Delhi Police asking for clarifications and status reports so that a decision on withdrawing cases against Sunair Hotels could be taken.
The ministry even wrote to the Delhi police commissioner asking for the status of investigation for appraising the Union Home Minister.
When Network 18 sent a questionnaire to Chidambaram to clarify his position and explain the apparent conflict of interest, a reply was sent by Home Ministry Joint Secretary M Gopal Reddy.
"The Home Minister is unable to recall at this distance of time whether he appeared in a case concerning M/s Sunair Hotels Pvt Ltd at any time between 1999 and 2003. When the file was submitted to the Home Minister, he noted on 4/5/2011 that MHA should not give any directions and MHA may only convey the advice of the Ministry of Law," said the reply.
However, in March, the Law Ministry had already given its opinion in a letter.
The ministry had written, "We are of the opinion that it is not appropriate to interfere in the investigation. However, if the representation of M/s Sunair Hotels Ltd falls under the ingredients of the said section, i.e.321 of CrPC, then the Ministry of Home Affairs may take suitable steps."
With the Law Ministry tossing the ball back in the Home Ministry's court, essentially suggesting it is for the Home Ministry to decide whether law in this case allows for withdrawal of the cases, a direction was promptly issued in the last week of November. It ordered the withdrawal of three FIRs, including one alleging misuse of the name of Sonia Gandhi and forging letters of several MPs, against businessman S P Gupta.
Delhi Police had already filed a chargesheet before a Delhi court on January 17, 2006 in FIR number 148 saying that S P Gupta and his associates had forged letterheads of MPs including Sonia Gandhi to lodge complaints against VLS Finance.
While the ministry in its response admits they have been writing to the Delhi government and the Law Ministry on the issue, they stressed, "The draft of the letter sent to Law Ministry was not put up to the Joint Secretary or the Home Secretary or the Home Minister. And that the Home Minister had seen this file only once i.e. on May 4, 2011 and the file had not been submitted to him for orders at any point of time before or after that date."
The letters written by the Home Ministry after P Chidambaram became the Home Minister clearly raises questions of a possible conflict of interest. Specially as there are reasons to argue and debate whether the Home Ministry went out of its way to pursue the withdrawal of criminal cases against a person, who was once the Union Home Minister's client.
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