Bombay HC grants bail to Gautam Thapar, promoter of Avantha Group

The Bombay High Court on Friday granted bail to Avantha Group promoter Gautam Thapar in the case pertaining to alleged sale of a property situated at Amrita Shergill Marg, New Delhi to a company owned by Rana Kapoor’s wife, Bindu Kapoor, for which an FIR had been registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in Mumbai last year.

A single bench of Justice Anuja Prabhudessai granted bail to Thapar on a bond of Rs 2 lakh.

The CBI had registered an offence against Thapar, Yes Bank founder Rana Kapoor and other accused under sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and sections 7, 11 and 12 of the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA).

The trail court had rejected the first bail application of Thapar earlier in December 2021.

The Enforcement Directorate was probing an alleged transaction between Thapar's company Avantha Realty and Yes Bank co-founder Rana Kapoor and his wife, who are already being investigated under PMLA by the agency.

Senior Advocate Mahesh Jethmalani appeared on behalf of Thapar, who is represented by the law firm Karanjawala & Co. led by Sandeep Kapur, Senior Partner and comprising of Vivek Suri and Abhimanshu Dhyani and Ravi Sharma, advocates.

Jethmalani submitted that after registration of the FIR, the Avantha Group promoter joined the investigation as and when called upon by the investigating agency. Further, it was argued that the chargesheet has been filed in the present case in October 2021 and summons were issued pursuant to which Thapar entered appearance before the trial court through counsel.

On October 1, 2021, the trial court had also taken cognisance of a chargesheet filed in the case against Thapar and 20 others.

The final report had alleged that the accused committed criminal breach of trust, cheating, criminal conspiracy and forgery for diversion and misappropriation of public money from 2017 to 2019 and caused a loss to the tune of Rs 466.51 crore to Yes Bank.

Thapar was not arrested by CBI throughout the investigation even before the chargesheet was filed and summons were issued by the trail court, as per the submission.
 
Accordingly, it was submitted that the present case is squarely covered under the guidelines issued by the Supreme Court regarding grant of bail in case titled as “Satender Kumar Antil v. CBI & Anr.” dated 07.10.2021 and the clarification order dated 16.12.2021 therein.

Hiten Venegaonkar, Ld. Sr. public prosecutor appeared on behalf of the respondent, CBI.

To be sure, Thapar has been granted bail in both the CBI and Enforcement Directorate matters related to the 40, Amrita Shergill Marg property.