<div><em>Financial scam accused has failed to get bail for 15 months. Isn’t that strange in India? asks <strong>Sutanu Guru</strong></em><br><br><br>What is it about Subrata Roy of Sahara that the Indian legal system seems to be working as it should ideally when it comes to dealing with his alleged financial scams and misdemeanors? After all, we are a country where the rich and the famous have an uncanny ability to avoid jail terms or avoid staying in jail even if they are convicted to serve a prison term. Given that background, the manner in which Roy continues to languish in Tihar jail since March, 2014 remains a baffling mystery. Granted Roy cocked a snook at the Supreme Court of India by ignoring its summons and orders. Granted Subroto Roy and his Sahara group have played cat and mouse for years with banking regulator RBI and market regulator SEBI. Granted the claims made by his company that it had made cash refunds to the tune of almost Rs 20,000 crore was stretching things a bit too far. But even hardened cynics raised eyebrows last year when the Supreme Court asked Roy and his companies to fulfill all conditions of a Rs 10,000-crore bail. That kind of money for bail in a financial scam when people accused of multiple murders get bail far more easily? Cynics are still gape jawed at the latest Supreme Court order. It maintains that bail is set at Rs 10,000 crore out of which Rs 5,000 crore has to be a cash deposit and another Rs 5,000 crore is to be a bank guarantee. Despite persuasive arguments of the Sahara and Roy counsel Kapil Sibal, the tycoon stays put in Tihar because he is yet to organise a Rs 5,000-crore bank guarantee.</div><div><div> </div><div>Contrast this with what has happened to the perpetrators of the 2008-09 Satyam scam. After a long trial, the former chairman and promoter of Satyam Computers Ramalinga Raju was convicted earlier this year by a special court on charges of fraud and sentenced to seven years in jail. The amount involved in the Satyam scam was not small change: well above Rs 7,500 crore was involved. So when Raju was convicted and sentenced, there were a lot of pundit talk of the law finally catching up with the high and mighty. But before more pundits could praise the Indian judicial system for improved delivery, the convicted Raju managed to get bail from the High Court. Just as Jayalalitha and Salman Khan did last year and this year. Just as Lalu Yadav had done. For that matter, even Ketan Parekh, notorious for the 2001 scam, is out on bail.<br> </div><div>There is one more tycoon who is out of jail and busy expanding his empire. P. Rajagopal, promoter of the well known Saravana chain of restaurants was convicted of murder and given a life term. He was accused of conspiring to murder the husband of an employee Jeevajyothi whom he wanted to marry. Rajagopal was given a life term by the High Court in 2009. He appealed in the Supreme Court against the verdict and managed a bail even as his appeal remains pending in the apex court. In the meanwhile, Saravana Bhavan has managed to become a truly global food chain with outlets in almost all continents.</div><div> </div><div>The last time a tycoon truly came to a bad end after facing the wrath of the law was about 20 years ago. That was Rajan Pillai, who controlled Brittania Industries among other companies then. He was arrested by authorities on various charges of economic offences, money laundering and foreign exchange violations. He couldn’t manage an immediate bail and was sent to Tihar jail. It was inside the jail that Pillai died a mysterious death, abandoned by former friends from the world of business and politics. </div><div> </div><div>Compared to Pillai, Subrata Roy is reportedly having a better time in Tihar jail. But that doesn’t take away the fact that his 15-month incarceration is unprecedented, whatever the purely “legal” merits of the case. Some argue that he is facing the music because Roy remained the quintessential “outsider” who refused to deal with Luytens Delhi. They cite the example of Om Prakash Chauthala and some of his family members to indicate how India treats “outsiders”. Convicted for 10 years in a teacher recruitment scam, Chauthala and his son are finding it virtually impossible to get bail. No one knows how true this Luytens Delhi and outsider theory is. But the very fact that someone like Subrata Roy has already spent 15 months behind bars without getting bail means there will be all sorts of theories. If nothing else, conspiracy theories and gossip do happen in Luytens Delhi! </div><div> </div></div>
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