Nowhera Shaikh granted bail

The Nampally court granted conditional bail to the Heera Group founder Dr Nowhera Shaikh on Wednesday. Ms Shaikh was asked to produce a surety of Rs 5 crore to the court and surrender passport to prevent her from leaving the country.

This comes as a setback for the Central Crime Station police which was seeking Ms Shaikh’s custody for further questioning in the case registered against her by the Economic Offences Wing. The cases were regarding allegations of cheating investors by promising them huge returns.

To a plea from the police to grant custody, the court asked why the state police wanted to investigate the case when the Serious Fraud Investigation Office was on the job. The persecution submitted a judgement given by the Madras High Court in a similar case in support of its claim.

“The prosecution referred to the case of YSRC chief Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy in which money laundering allegations were also present. It told the court that the case needed



the custody of Ms Shaikh to investigate her income sources due to her promises of unusual returns and claiming unusual profits. The police expressed concern over national security suspecting that the organisation could be funding from anti-national agencies, and wanted to probe her sources of income,” said sources close to the police.

The court on Wednesday evening turned down the custody petition and gave the order to release Ms Shaikh on bail with certain conditions.

“She was asked to be present before investigating officials from October 27 to October 31, without fail. She has to produce a surety of Rs 5 crore to the court before October 29, surrender her passport and not leave the city without the court’s permission,” said the sources.

Mild tension prevailed outside the court premises when a few women claiming to be victims of the schemes of the Heera Group tried to stop defence lawyer Vineeth Dhanda.