Tribune News Service
New Delhi, April 5
The Supreme Court today stayed a Delhi HC order to the Associated Journals Ltd (AJL) — publisher of Congress mouthpiece National Herald — to vacate the Herald House building in New Delhi.
Staying the February 28 order of the Delhi HC, a Bench headed by CJI Ranjan Gogoi also issued a notice to the Centre’s Land and Development Office (L&DO) on AJL’s petition, asking it to respond to AJL’s petition in four weeks.
The Delhi HC had held that transfer of AJL shares to Young Indian (YI) — in which Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi are majority shareholders — was a “clandestine and surreptitious transfer of the lucrative interest in premises” to YI.
The Bench sought to know from Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing L&DO, as to how the alleged “clandestine” transfer of shares of AJL to YI, in which the Gandhis’ have controlling stake, amounted to violation of lease agreement. “Will this amount to violation of lease agreement? We will have to examine,” it said. AJL on March 11 moved the SC against a Delhi HC order dismissing its plea to restrain the Centre from taking coercive steps to vacate Herald House. It requested the top court to set aside the Centre’s October 30, 2018 order ending its 56-year-old lease.
SC Seeks govt reply
- The SC has issued notice to the Centre’s Land and Development Office on the AJL plea and sought its response within four weeks
- The Delhi HC held that transfer of AJL shares to Young Indian — in which Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi are shareholders — was ‘clandestine, surreptitious’
- Issuing notice to Centre, the Bench questioned how the alleged ‘clandestine’ transfer of shares of AJL to YI amounted to violation of lease agreement
from The Tribune http://bit.ly/2uPGdta
via Today’s News Headlines
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