Disproportionate assets case: Court allows Om Prakash Chautala to go to US for treatment

A Delhi court today granted permission to former Haryana Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala, against whom a disproportionate assets case is going on, to go to the US for treatment of his leg.

Special CBI Judge P S Teji allowed release of Chautala's passport, which was impounded by the court while granting him bail in the case, and asked him to place a Fixed Deposit Receipt (FDR) of Rs4 lakh before it.

Opposing the plea for release of passport, the CBI submitted that the charges were still not framed against Chautala.

In an application filed before the court, Chautala had submitted that he wanted to visit Washington from June 16 to July 31 for treatment with regard to post-polio residual deformation in his left knee and ankle.

75-year-old Chautala is a five-time chief minister and had last held the post between July 1999 to March 2005. He currently represents Uchana Kalan constituency of Hissar district in Haryana Assembly.

CBI had on March 26 filed the chargesheet against Chautala for allegedly possessing assets worth Rs 6crore disproportionate to known sources of his income between 1993 and 2006.

It had registered a case in a designated court here in April 2006 and searched 24 premises of the Chautalas in Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal and Chandigarh during which it had seized Rs 13 lakh in cash and frozen five bank accounts containing Rs 1.34 crore belonging to Chautala and his family members.

The probe agency had filed chargesheets against two sons of Chautala --Ajay and Abhay Singh-- both Haryana MLAs on similar charges.