Former Judicial Magistrate First Class (JMIC) SS Bhardwaj was sentenced to one-year jail for evading arrest in 2003 after the CBI had raided his residence in a Rs 7-lakh graft case. Bhardwaj has the dubious distinction of being the first Indian judge to be convicted in a graft case.
A lower court had earlier acquitted him of the charge of evading arrest, against which the state had filed an appeal. The appeal was accepted by an Additional District and Sessions Judge.
The convict has also been directed to pay a fine of Rs 5,000. Bhardwaj, along with District and Sessions Judge RM Gupta, was accused of demanding a bribe of Rs 11 lakh for passing favourable orders on an anticipatory bail application pending in Gupta’s court in 2003.
Bhardwaj had escaped from his residence on May 10, 2003, after he was caught taking Rs 7 lakh from a complainant to help him in a bail matter. He was arrested a month later and faced trial in both cases – graft case and under Section 224 (resistance or obstruction by a person to his lawful apprehension) of the IPC.
In May 2009, the special CBI court here had convicted Bhardwaj and awarded him a three-year jail. The former Judge challenged the verdict and the matter is pending in the High Court. However, in February 2014, a JMIC court here had acquitted Bhardwaj in the resistance-to-arrest case. The state had filed an appeal and the same was decided on September 19.
Pleads for leniency
Former JMIC SS Bhardwaj pleaded leniency in the sentence stating that he had lost his job and benefits and had faced the agony of trial for 14 years. The court, however, observed in the judgment that it does not find any reason to show leniency towards the accused because “if any misplaced sympathy is shown towards the accused, it shall not be good for society”.
