RJD leads by over 34,000 votes in Bihar's Jokihat Assembly seat
Patna, May 31: The opposition Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) is set to wrest an Assembly seat from the ruling Janata Dal-United (JD-U) in Bihar where it was leading by over 34,000 votes, officials said on Thursday.
After trailing in the initial round of counting, the RJD established a comfortable lead of over 31,000 against JD-U in the bypolls to the Jokihat Assembly seat in Bihar on Thursday, according to the Election Commission officials.
After 20 rounds of the ongoing ballot counting, RJD candidate Shahbawaz Alam established a comfortable lead over JD-U's Murshid Alam.
The Jokikhat seat fell vacant following the resignation of JD-U MLA Sarfaraz Alam, who joined the RJD.
Voting for the seat took place on Monday.
The JD-U was backed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), while the RJD had the support of the Congress and Hindustani Awam Morcha (Secular) of former Chief Minister Jitan Ram Manjhi.
Jokihat is a Muslim-dominated Assembly constituency, considered as a stronghold of former Union Minister and Shahnawaz Alam's father Mohammad Taslimuddin, who died last year leading to bypolls in Araria Lok Sabha seat.
This is for the second time this year the RJD contested polls in the absence of RJD chief Lalu Prasad, who was jailed after being convicted in fodder scam case.
At present, Lalu Prasad is undergoing treatment at a private hospital in Mumbai following provisional bail.
The RJD, under the leadership of Tejashwi Yadav, former Deputy Chief Minister and younger son of Lalu Prasad, proved again that it has an edge over the JD-U of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.
Two months ago, the RJD has defeated JD-U in bypolls to Jahanbad assembly seat and bypolls to Araria Lok Sabha seat.
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BharatPe fraud case: Delhi HC quashes lookout circular against Ashneer Grover, wife
New Delhi, Nov 12: The Delhi High Court has ordered cancellation of a lookout circular (LOC) issued against Ashneer Grover, the former MD of payment app BharatPe, and his wife Madhuri Jain Grover, noting that the FIR lodged against them over allegations of cheating and forgery has already been quashed.
Justice Sanjeev Narula passed the order on Monday after the court was informed that another bench of the high court quashed the FIR on the same day.
The FIR was quashed by Justice Chandra Dhari Singh after considering a plea moved by the Grovers stating that they have arrived at a settlement with the fintech company.
In his order, Justice Narula said, "Although the copy of the order (quashing the FIR) is not available as of now, the aforenoted fact is not disputed by the counsel for the parties.
"In light of the fact that the underlying FIR has been quashed, the LOC issued by respondent No. 3 (Bureau of Immigration), in the opinion of the court, will not survive."
The LOC was issued by the Bureau of Immigration at the instance of Delhi Police's Economic Offences Wing (EOW) in view of the investigation against the Grovers in the cheating and forgery FIR.
The court was hearing a plea moved by Grover and his wife Madhuri Jain Grover seeking quashing of the LOC issued against them in connection with the investigation into the cheating and forgery case.
"Accordingly, the present petitions are disposed of with a direction to the respondents to cancel the LOC against the petitioners in their records," the court noted.
Earlier, the Grovers claimed that they were informed about the LOC for the first time when they were detained at the Indira Gandhi International Airport here on November 16, 2023, while they were scheduled to travel to the US.
After being detained, they were informed that the LOC was operational from November 6, 2023.
In May last year, the EOW filed an FIR against Grover, his wife Madhuri, and others under eight sections of the Indian Penal Code, including 406 (criminal breach of trust), 420 (cheating and dishonesty), 467 and 468 (forgery), and 471 (using forged documents as genuine) for an alleged Rs 81 crore fraud after a complaint was lodged by BhartPe, the fintech unicorn.
In its complaint, BharatPe alleged that Grover and his family caused damages to the tune of Rs 81.3 crore through illegitimate payments to bogus human resource consultants, inflated and undue payments through pass-through vendors connected to the accused, sham transactions in input tax credit and payment of penalty to GST authorities, illegal payment to travel agencies, forged invoices by Madhuri, and destruction of evidence.
Madhuri was the head of controls at BharatPe before she was fired in 2022 after a forensic audit revealed several irregularities.
Subsequently, Grover resigned as the chief executive officer of the fintech firm in March 2022.
