Cable operator suicide: Witness judges refuse to hear bail pleas

The local courts on Tuesday refused to hear the bail applications of the three accused in the cable operator suicide case of March 28 on the grounds most local judges were on the spot where Jaswinder Singh Jassi attempted suicide.

The local courts on Tuesday refused to hear the bail applications of the three accused in the cable operator suicide case of March 28 on the grounds most local judges were on the spot where Jaswinder Singh Jassi attempted suicide.

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The bail application of Sarabjit Singh Raju, Gurinder Singh Bubby and Pritpal Singh Lalli now will come up on May 7 in the court of Tarn Taran additional sessions judge SP Sood. The accused are in Amritsar Central Jail. When the application first came up before the court of local additional sessions judge SS Sahni, who excused himself from the case, saying he was witness to the suicide attempt during a meeting of Telecom Disputes Settlement and Appellate Tribunal (TDSAT). Cable operator Jassi, later, died in hospital on March 30; and Raju, Bubby and Lalli were arrested for driving him to this point.

The judge then referred the case to his senior, district sessions judge Gurbir Singh, who also recused from hearing the applications on similar grounds and moved the case to the adjoining district of Tarn Taran, since no judicial officer from there had attended the March 28 meeting of TDSAT in which judges of the Supreme Court and the Punjab and Haryana high court were also present.