Uphaar tragedy: Ansal brothers' approach Sessions Court challenging 7-yr jail term

New Delhi, Nov 10 (IANS) Real estate barons Sushil Ansal, Gopal Ansal on Wednesday filed an appeal in the Sessions Court challenging the seven-year imprisonment handed down to them for tampering with the evidence in the 1997 Uphaar fire tragedy case.

Additional Sessions Judge Anil Antil issued notice and sought the response of the government and the Association of Victims of the Uphaar Tragedy (AVUT) in the matter. Senior Counsel PK Dubey, who appeared for Gopal Ansal, objected to the locus of AVUT. He also submitted that his client was suffering from certain ailments. However, the judge sought a report from the medical superintendent of Tihar jail in this regard.

Advocate Vikas Pahwa, representing AVUT, opposed the submission of the Ansals. The court will take up the matter for further hearing on November 15.

On Monday, Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (CMM), Patiala House Court, Dr Pankaj Sharma, had sentenced Ansals to seven years imprisonment besides imposing a fine of Rs 2.25 crore on both in the case.

The court also awarded seven-year-jail term each to former court staffers P P Batra, Anoop Singh and Dinesh Chand Sharma while slapping them a fine of Rs 3 lakh each. "After thinking over nights and nights, I have come to the conclusion that they deserve punishment," said while pronouncing the judgment. The convicts, out on bail, were taken into custody after the order was pronounced. The CMM also said that it was one of the longest cases in his judicial career. Earlier, the Ansals were convicted and sentenced to two years in jail by the Supreme Court.

The brothers had escaped further jail terms after the court's direction in 2015 to shell out Rs 60 crore in penalty. In February 2017, the top court had, through a 2:1 majority judgment, given relief to 78-year-old Sushil Ansal, citing his "advanced age-related complications" by awarding him the jail term which he had already served.

However, the court had asked his younger brother Gopal Ansal to serve the remaining one-year jail term. On June 13, 1997, halfway through the screening of the Hindi film "Border", a fire broke out in the Uphaar cinema, located in Green Park in south Delhi, killing 59 people in one of the worst tragedies.