High Court calls for status report

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, November 17

The CBI, which is probing the Pradyuman murder case, was today asked by the Punjab and Haryana High Court to produce the status report or case diary.

The direction by Justice Surinder Gupta came during the hearing of bail petitions filed by the Pinto family, owners of Ryan institutions. Fixing November 21 for further hearing in the matter, Justice Gupta also made it clear that the stay on the arrest of the Pinto family would continue.

As the case came up for resumed hearing, senior advocates RS Cheema and RS Rai, along with Arshdeep S. Cheema, Anurag Arora and Sandeep Kapoor argued that the petitioners had not been called by the CBI for investigation. They were ready to cooperate and appear before the CBI, whenever required.

Rai said nothing new had cropped up against the petitioners and the management during the course of investigation by the CBI despite two arrests in the case. Rather, there was no incriminating evidence against them or the management.

CBI counsel Sumeet Goel argued: “Prima facie, careless attitude of the management has aided Pradyuman’s murder. Investigation is at a crucial stage and a larger conspiracy is yet to be unearthed. Any relief at this stage may hamper investigation.”

Counsel appearing for Pradyuman’s father also objected to bail on the grounds that the petitioners had directly approached the High Court instead of moving Gurgaon courts.

Granting regular bail to Ryan International Group’s northern zone head Francis Thomas and HR head Jayesh Thomas, the High Court had on October 7 also granted interim bail to founding chairman Augustine Pinto, MD Grace Pinto and their son, Ryan Pinto.