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indiantelevision.com Team
MUMBAI: A Delhi court has allowed Zee Group chairman Subhash Chandra to undergo a lie detector test in the presence of his lawyer on a plea filed by him based on the advice of his doctors.
Allowing the plea of Chandra, Metropolitan Magistrate Gaurav Rao said, ?As far as accused Subhash Chandra is concerned, he has consented for the test. I have gone through his statement?.
?In terms of his statement as well as in terms of input provided by Dr Asha Srivastava, Senior Scientific Officer..., which have been made aware to the accused, the accused shall consult his doctor and thereafter undergo the test.
?The test shall be conducted... the accused shall have the right to take along with him his counsel.?
Zee News Limited (ZNL) is fighting a legal battle with Congress MP Naveen Jindal who has alleged that the Zee News editors Sudhir Chaudhary and Samir Ahluwalia tried to extort Rs 1 billion from his company officials to go slow on its coverage of alleged Coal scam.
Jindal?s company is also alleged to have benefited from arbitrary allocation of coal blocks by the Government of India.
The court also rejected Delhi Police plea to subject the two arrested editors for the polygraph test as they refused to give their consent. The court, however, granted permission to the police to collect voice sample of Ahluwalia and Chaudhary.
Chaudhary and Ahluwalia were arrested on 27 November and are presently lodged in Tihar jail. The two will remain in judicial custody till 22 December after their bail plea was rejected.
Dismissing Delhi Police?s plea for subjecting Chaudhary and Ahluwalia to a lie detector test, the court said: ?In terms of the statement made by the accused, Samir and Sudhir wherein they have not consented to undergo the lie detector test...the application of IO is dismissed as the accused persons cannot be forced or compelled to undergo the same as it violates the right against self incrimination. Article 20 (3) of the constitution protects their right.?
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