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Uphaar fire tragedy: Delhi court convicts Ansal brothers for tampering evidence
A former court staff, Dinesh Chand Sharma, was also convicted in the case. As many as 59 lives were lost in the fire tragedy.
A Delhi court on Friday convicted real estate barons Sushil Ansal and Gopal Ansal along with two of their employees among others in a case related to tampering with the crucial evidence in the 1997 Uphaar fire tragedy case. A former court staff, Dinesh Chand Sharma, was also convicted in the case.
Chief metropolitan magistrate Pankaj Sharma had reserved the order on Thursday after the conclusion of final arguments in the matter.
The case is related to tampering with the evidence of the fire tragedy in which 59 lives were lost. The Ansals were convicted and sentenced to two years in jail by the Supreme Court.
The apex court had, however, released them on the period already undergone in the jail on the condition that they paid ₹30 crore fine each to be used for building a trauma centre in the national capital.
The Ansal brothers along with Sharma, and other individuals -- PP Batra, Har Swaroop Panwar, Anoop Singh, and Dharamvir Malhotra -- were booked in the present case.
Panwar and Malhotra died during the course of the trial.
Senior advocate Vikas Pahwa, appearing for the complainant Association of Victims of Uphaar Tragedy (AVUT), told the court on Thursday that Ansals and HS Panwar had hatched a criminal conspiracy of the destruction of the most vital piece of evidence collected by the CBI against them in the main Uphaar case.
“The documents were handpicked and were tampered with, mutilated, torn and some also went missing,” he told the court.
(With agency inputs)
