Dhananjay Singh was reportedly preparing to contest elections from Jaunpur. (File)
The Allahabad High Court on Saturday granted bail to former MP Dhananjay Singh but refused his plea to suspend or stay a seven-year imprisonment sentence passed by a district court in a 2020 kidnapping and extortion case.
After the high court order, Mr Singh will be released on bail, but he cannot contest the election.
The MP-MLA court in Jaunpur on March 6, sentenced Mr Singh and his associate Santosh Vikram to seven years of rigorous imprisonment in a 2020 case of the kidnapping and extortion of Namami Gange project manager Abhinav Singhal.
After hearing the criminal appeal filed by the former MP and his associate on April 24, Justice Sanjay Kumar Singh had reserved the order.
This appeal was filed against the judgment passed by the special judge, Jaunpur MP/MLA on March 6.
Mr Singh's wife Srikala Reddy is contesting elections from the Jaunpur parliamentary constituency on the Bahujan Samaj Party ticket. Mr Singh was reportedly preparing to contest the Lok Sabha elections from Jaunpur seat but his conviction made him ineligible to contest the election.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)