PTI
Pune, Jun 29: Abdul Karim Telgi, the kingpin of the multi-crore fake stamp scam, was on Thursday sentenced to rigorous imprisonment for 13 years and fined over Rs 100 crore by a court here after he dramatically broke down while pleading guilty and seeking leniency.
Judge Chitra Bhedi of the special court pronounced the quantum of punishment in one of the main cases in the scam, hours after Telgi pleaded guilty and repented his actions. She said the court had taken "a lenient view" since Telgi "had volunteered to plead guilty" and because of his health condition. Telgi is HIV-positive.
The judge said the sentence could have been harsher if he had not pleaded guilty with 42 other convicts. She awarded varying jail terms to Telgi under various sections of the IPC and Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), the maximum being RI for 13 years, and fined him over Rs 100 crore.
All the sentences will run concurrently and the convicts are eligible for remission, the order said. The other convicts were given six-year prison terms and fined a maximum of Rs five lakh.
The order said if Telgi failed to pay the fines, he would have to undergo additional prison terms, with the maximum term being three years and three months.
The case for which Telgi was sentenced was filed by Bundgarden police here and related to the seizure of fake government stamps and stamp papers from a car in 2002.
This is the harshest punishment given to Telgi in any of the fake stamp paper cases he has been convicted for so far in Maharashtra and Karnataka.
The fine was also one of the highest ever imposed by a court.
Telgi, 46, broke down in the court room and thanked the judge for giving him and his co-accused "justice". The prosecution had sought a 20-year prison term for him but Telgi's lawyer Harshad Nimbalkar asked that it be reduced to 10 years.
CBI counsel Raja Thakre also moved an application in the court for confiscating Telgi's property to recover the fine slapped on him.
Thakre had earlier vehemently opposed Nimbalkar's plea for leniency for Telgi on the grounds of his ill-health and his voluntary admission of guilt.
He said Telgi was "shedding crocodile tears" and any leniency for him would "send wrong signals to the people".
Telgi's wife Shahida, who is free on bail, was one of the accused but she did not plead guilty, saying she was unaware of her husband's activities.
"My days are numbered," Shahida told the court, referring to her own HIV-positive status.
The fake stamp paper case before the special court here was considered the biggest in magnitude when compared to cases pending against Telgi in other parts of the country.
Telgi, who has so far been convicted in five cases and discharged in four others, said after his sentencing: "I have admitted my sins. I took this decision after meeting my wife."
He claimed politicians were involved in the scam. "The whole nation knows this. I have never denied it and nor am I denying it now," he told a TV news channel. "However, I will go by the decision made by the judge."
Telgi has been held in judicial custody at Yeravada here and in Bangalore for about five years following his arrest in Ajmer. Twenty-five more cases against him are pending in Ahmedabad, Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad and Pune.