Sonia Dhawan Files Bail Plea In Allahabad HC After Noida Court Rejects It

After the District and Sessions Court, Surajpur-Noida rejected the bail plea of the former Paytm vice president, communications, Sonia Dhawan, over  the ongoing  extortion case, in which she is accused of hatching a plan to extort money from Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Dhawan has now moved to the Allahabad High Court seeking bail.

Speaking to Inc42, Satish Kumar, her lawyer, however, told that the date regarding the bail application has not been listed yet, but he is sure that Dhawan will get bail at the Allahabad High Court.

This was the second time when the Noida Court has rejected Dhawan’s bail application. Her last bail application was also turned down by the court on November 23.

Dhawan has been in the district jail, Gautam Buddh Nagar for the last four months. On October 22, 2018, Ajay Shekhar Sharma, senior vice president-Paytm and Vijay Shekhar’s brother had lodged a complaint against four people — Sonia Dhawan, her husband Roopak Jain, another Paytm admin staff Devendra Kumar and his friend Rohit Chomal — accusing that the four allegedly stole personal data of his brother and had demanded an extortion amount of INR 10 Cr.

Following the complaint, the Noida police of Sector 20 had filed an FIR and arrested all the accused barring Rohit Chomal within 24 hours of the complaint.

While the Police has already filed the chargesheet in this case, in Dhawan’s defence, her lawyer claimed that there is no evidence of Dhawan’s involvement in the alleged extortion call received by complainant Ajay Shekhar Sharma and Vijay Shekhar Sharma.

Meanwhile, Dhawan’s husband, Roopak Jain, has already been released after being granted bail by the Allahabad High Court on January 31.

Earlier, Dhawan had also alleged that she and her husband had received similar extortion calls from an unknown number and that they have already submitted a copy of the FIR pertaining to the call. She also said that there were no mentions of her in the WhatsApp messages shared between Chomal and Ajay Shekhar Sharma.

The Surajpur Court, however, stated that adequate evidence has been found against the accused (Dhawan) during the investigation. Her active involvement in the crime has come to light. Keeping in mind the facts and circumstances and seeing that she, along with her husband and other co-accused, has committed a serious crime of a grave nature, grounds are not enough to grant her bail and the bail application is rejected.

Meanwhile, Rajveer Singh Chauhan has been appointed as the new SHO of Sector 20 police station, Gautam Buddh Nagar after Manoj Pant, the former SHO — the lead investing officer in this case —  has been arrested and put behind the bars. Pant was caught red-handed last week, accepting a bribe of INR 8 Lakh from an accused and promising him to remove his name from the FIR.