JBT scam: Delhi High Court grants three weeks parole to O P Chautala

NEW DELHI (INDIA): The Delhi High Court today granted three weeks parole to former Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala, serving a 10-year jail term in teachers’ recruitment scam case, for or maintaining “social ties”.nnJustice Vipin Sanghi ordered Chautala’s release for three weeks without restraining his movement out of Delhi, and said that the relief is granted to “re-establish his ties with the society and the family members”.nnThe court’s order came on Chautala’s petition seeking six months’ parole to allow him “return to the mainstream”.nnThe INLD leader, through his counsel Amit Sahni, has said that the Delhi government’s December 14 decision denying him relief was passed in “an extremely unfair manner upon flimsy grounds”.nn82-year-old Chautala also said that he is “polio-affected since his birth and has permanent disability of 60 per cent”.nnHe said he was on bail during the trial and was released on parole, but he has never misused the same.nnChautala, his son Ajay Chautala and three others are serving 10-years jail term in the case.nnThe Supreme Court in August 2015 had dismissed Chautalas’ appeals against the high court’s verdict upholding their conviction and sentence of 10 years awarded by a trial court in the junior basic trained (JBT) teachers recruitment scam case.nnThe high court had on March 5, 2015 upheld the 10-year jail terms awarded to the two Chautalas and three others, saying, “The overwhelming evidence showed spine-chilling state of affairs in the country.”nnThe father-son duo and 53 others, including two IAS officers, were among 55 persons convicted on January 16, 2013 by the trial court for illegally recruiting 3,206 JBT teachers in Haryana in 2000.nnSource: Press Trust of India