Hearing on anticipatory bail petitions of former disgraced Haryana DGP SPS Rathore and his plea for quashing of the charge of abetment to suicide in the Ruchika molestation case was on Monday in Chandigarh adjourned till January 25 by the Punjab and Haryana High Court.
Justice Sabina adjourned the hearing on the three cases, including two anticipatory bail petitions in fresh FIRs levelling serious criminal charges against 67-year-old Rathore, after the former IPS officer's lawyer-wife Abha pointed out that she had not been given copies of the reply of CBI and those of Ruchika s father Subhash Chander Girhotra and brother Ashu.
Anmol Rattan Sidhu, counsel for CBI, which has been handed over the probe into the fresh cases, sought four weeks' time to reply to Rathore s petition seeking quashing of the third FIR against him registered on the complaint of Ashu under section 306 IPC (abetment to suicide).
Justice Sabina directed the CBI counsel to file the reply on January 25 when the petitions would be taken up.
Abha told the court that though a 30-member CBI team was conducting the investigation, so far they have not been able to bring out anything against Rathore on record. "Whatever they have, they should put it before the court," she pleaded.
On January 12, the High Court, while giving no relief to Rathore, had posted for today arguments on the petitions of the former IPS officer while asking CBI, which is probing the case, to give its response to the cases.
Rathore had got away with a lighter sentence of six-month imprisonment awarded by the CBI court for molesting 14-year-old Ruchika on August 12, 1990, three years after which she committed suicide. PTI
