UT police gave NOC for Manu parole in a day

CHANDIGARH: The shameful stranglehold of influential people on police, once again, came to fore when an RTI query by The Times of India threw up
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the fact that Chandigarh cops acted in no time to serve up a no-objection certificate (NOC) that went on to help Jessica Lal murder convict Sidhartha Vashishtha, alias Manu Sharma, get parole from Delhi government on September 22.

Acting swiftly to beat its own deadline, UT police, after receiving a letter from Delhi deputy secretary, home (jail), on September 4 2009, for a verification on the criminal background of Sharma - son of big-gun Congress leader Venod Sharma of Sector 9, Chandigarh - dispatched an NOC the very next day.

A response to the RTI application filed by TOI on November 27 was received on Monday, clearly stating that UT police took a maximum of two months and a minimum of 15 days to dispatch NOCs on parole applications. According to the reply, against 55 applications that arrived between December 1, 2008 and December 1, 2009 from Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana, Punjab, Maharashtra and Chandigarh's Burail jail, UT police issued NOCs in 26 cases, with only Sharma's coming through within a day.

While verification was done by personnel of Sector 3 police station, Sharma, lodged in Delhi's Tihar Jail, was reportedly granted parole on the grounds that he had to take care of his ailing, aged mother, attend a ceremony in the memory of his grandmother and complete some business formalities. But once out of jail, he was spotted at a swish nightclub in the Capital, while his mother was seen at a public function in Chandigarh.

HC rap

The Delhi High Court also came down heavily on Delhi government for granting freedom to the convict with such alacrity

Delhi's bidding

'The verification letter from Delhi mentioned the words high court and time-bound, forcing us to furnish details immediately'