desk
Share
News Topical, Digital Desk : The Bombay High Court on Tuesday indicated that it was not inclined to grant parole to jailed underworld don Abu Salem to visit his hometown in Uttar Pradesh after his lawyer expressed his inability to pay the police escort fee.
A division bench of Justices Ajay Gadkari and Shyam Chandak made it clear that it cannot negotiate over the security deposit of more than Rs 17 lakh. Salem, who is serving a 25-year sentence in the 1993 Mumbai bomb blasts case, has sought parole to visit his native place in Azamgarh district to mourn the death of his brother Abu Hakim Ansari.
The court had previously suggested that he could avail of parole under police protection after paying the required fees himself. On Tuesday, his lawyer, Farhana Shah, told the court that the security fee was too high. Her client had been in jail for years and was in a dire financial situation.
Authorities have asked Salem, lodged in the Nashik Road Central Jail in north Maharashtra, to pay over Rs 17 lakh for the police escort party to accompany him if he is granted parole by a court to visit his hometown.
Shah told the court that the extradited underworld don would not be able to pay more than one lakh rupees. The bench said it could not negotiate. If he wanted to go to his native place with police protection, he would have to pay the mandatory fee.
--Advertisement--
