New Delhi: The Supreme Court Wednesday extended the interim bail for social activist Teesta Setalvad and her husband in connection with two criminal cases till April 29 but declined to make the bail order absolute.
Teesta and her husband Javed Anand have been named as accused in cases of alleged embezzlement of funds and for alleged violation of Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA). Appearing for the couple, senior advocate Kapil Sibal urged a bench led by Justice Anil R Dave not to specify any date of the interim bail and to make the bail stand “till the further orders of the court”.
But the bench declined it. It told Sibal that it has already extended the bail by a period of more than a month and that the prayer for regular bail can be made before the bench which would take up the matter for a regular hearing, The Indian Express reported.
While Gujarat police is probing the alleged embezzlement of funds for a museum at Ahmedabad’s Gulbarg Society that was devastated in the 2002 riots, the CBI is investigating the purported violations of the FCRA in connection with the utilisation of funds received from Ford Foundation by Sabrang Communications and Publishing Pvt Ltd, run by the couple.