Punjab Minister Aman Arora, 8 Others, Jailed For 2 Years In 2008 Case

Punjab Minister Aman Arora and eight others were sentenced to a two-year imprisonment by a court in Sangrur district on Thursday in a 15-year-old case in which a relative of Aman Arora had accused him of attacking him in his house.

The court of Gurbhinder Singh Johal, Sub-divisional Judicial Magistrate, Sunam, convicted Aman Arora and eight others in a 2008 case filed on the complaint of the Minister's brother-in-law Rajinder Deepa.

Aman Arora holds the new and renewable energy, printing and stationery, employment generation, and training and governance reforms portfolios in the Bhagwant Mann cabinet. The nine were booked in the matter under several sections of IPC, including 452 (house-trespass) and 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt).

The court sentenced them to two-year imprisonment under section 452 and one-year imprisonment under section 323 of the IPC. Both sentences will run concurrently.

"This court is of the view that the prosecution has been successful in bringing home the guilt of the accused persons ... on the basis of the oral and documentary evidence on file, it stands proved beyond shadow of reasonable doubt that accused persons in furtherance of their common intention caused simple injuries to the complainant after trespassing into his house for causing hurt to complainant by assaulting him," the court's order read.

Aman Arora after his conviction told reporters in Sangrur that he would approach a higher court against the verdict and had complete faith in the judicial system.

He said a compromise had been reached between him and Deepa in 2012 but his brother-in-law reneged on his end of the promise.

Advocate Sushil, the counsel representing Deepa, said Deepa had filed complaints against ten people, out of which, one died amid trial.

He said the convicts moved an application before the court that they wanted to file an appeal in a higher court.

They have a 30-day time period to file an appeal, he said. 

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)