Telgi to plead guilty in all Delhi cases

“My client has maintained that he wishes to confess his offences in connection with the fake stamp paper cases registered against him in the capital. The plea is free from any kind of coercion or pressure and is in accordance with the legal provisions,” Telgi’s counsel Anwar Ahmed Khan told Additional Sessions Judge A K Pathak at Karkardooma courts.

While three cases against Telgi are pending at Tis hazari,two are pending at Karkardooma. Telgi,along with over 20 others,faces charges of possessing and selling counterfeit stamps worth crores in the capital and NCR.

Earlier booked under the stringent charge of printing the fake stamps that was punishable with a life term,a sessions court had last year dropped the said charge against Telgi asking the CBI to prosecute him only for selling the counterfeits. The maximum punishment under these sections is seven years in jail apart from monetary penalty. The Delhi High Court had upheld the dropping of the charges saying that the evidence on record only pointed to the possession and selling of the fake stamps.

Telgi,who appears in the Delhi courts through video-conferencing from Yerrawada jail in Pune,had recently written to his counsel Khan,communicating his willingness to plead guilty in all the cases.

“He had sent me a letter from the jail. He wrote that since the trial could take more than 20 years and that he had already spent more than seven years behind bars,he must plead guilty so that all the trials in the capital get concluded as soon as possible. Even if he is sentenced to the maximum term,the court will have to take into account the period already undergone in detention during the trial,” the counsel told The Indian Express .

Khan said that Telgi had already pleaded guilty in all the seven cases against him in Mumbai and a court in Pune has already sentenced him to 13 year-jail terms in connection with the scam.

The judges,however,observed that it was required under the law that charges be framed against all the accused before accepting their guilty plea and put off the matter till March 9.