Supreme Court refuses Sukesh Chandrasekhar's plea to stay conviction

The Supreme Court refused to hear Sukesh Chandrasekhar's plea seeking a stay on his conviction. The decision leaves his appeal and objections for the appellate court to examine.

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear a plea by alleged conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar seeking a stay on his conviction in a criminal case, the Press Trust of India reported.

Chandrasekhar was sentenced to eight years in jail by a Delhi court for impersonating a Supreme Court judge in an attempt to influence a special judge over bail in a 2017 corruption case.

The Delhi court convicted Chandrasekhar on August 20 and sentenced him on August 29. He later approached the Delhi High Court, challenging the trial court's rejection of his application to stay his conviction and sentence until his appeal was decided.

On October 16, the high court disposed of his plea, saying no case had been made out for staying the conviction. It said: "Having considered the submissions, this court is of the view that, since the appeal against the judgment of conviction is already pending, the petitioner's objections to the findings recorded therein, including the adverse observations and expressions used by the trial court, are matters which ought to be examined by the appellate court."

The high court allowed Chandrasekhar to raise all his arguments before the appellate court. He then challenged the high court's order in the Supreme Court, where a bench of Justices J B Pardiwala and Manmohan refused to hear his petition on Monday.

According to the Press Trust of India, the Delhi court described Chandrasekhar's act as "institutional sacrilege". It sentenced him to two years of rigorous imprisonment each for impersonating a public servant and intimidating a public servant, and four years for criminal intimidation through anonymous communication.

The court ordered the sentences to run consecutively, taking the total jail term to eight years.

The case arose from a phone call made on April 28, 2017, when Chandrasekhar was in police custody in connection with a corruption case. According to the prosecution, he gained access to a police constable's mobile phone and used it to contact the official landline and mobile phone of Poonam Chaudhary, who was then a special judge handling cases under the Prevention of Corruption Act.

The trial court said Chandrasekhar first impersonated the private secretary of a former Supreme Court judge and later posed as the judge himself. It held that the prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt that he deliberately assumed the identity of a Supreme Court judge to interfere with the administration of justice.

With the Supreme Court refusing to hear his petition, Chandrasekhar's appeal against his conviction remains pending before the appellate court, where he can raise his objections to the trial court's findings.