The All India Bharatiya Congress president was first produced in the court of Metropolitan Magistrate (MM) K.S Mohi along with his associate Vinod Kumar Luthra in connection with a cheating case filed by MP M K Subba. Sharma was remanded to police custody, despite the fact that a partially-heard police remand application was pending in the court of MM Jai Prakash Narain.

On October 28, Sharma was arrested in MM Narain's court itself in connection with a case filed by Sanjay Sabharwal at the Hauz Khas police station on October 22. The MM had remanded him to judicial custody till today, and the remand application was heard only partly. The Crime Branch, however, did not bother to inform MM Mohi about this. In fact, ACP (Crime Branch) Jaipal Singh moved an application for Sharma's police remand in MM Mohi's court.

MM Narain said in his order: ``This shows the ignorance of law on part of police officers ... and in a way they became instrumental in preventing that court from knowing all the relevant circumstances.'' The magistrate has issued directions that a copy of the order be sent to Commissioner of Police V.N. Singh ``to take appropriate measures so that this legal anarchy may not happen again''.

MM Narain lashed out at the ACP for creating so much confusion: ``Don't you know the procedure?'' The ACP could only mumble, ``Investigating Officer (IO) Rajiv Midha is misleading the court''.

The Crime Branch first produced Sharma and Luthra in MM Mohi's court in connection with a case (FIR no. 7/97) registered by Subba alleging that Sharma had grabbed his Jai Mata Di farmhouse in Chattarpur, south Delhi, on the basis of forged documents prepared with the connivance of Luthra. Both were arrested today in this case. The Crime Branch asked for seven days police custody for the two, saying that it needed to recover the forged documents; that other associates were still to be arrested; and that it needed to conduct a detailed interrogation to verify Sharma's underworld links.

In Luthra's case the MM said in his order: ``The prosecution has failed to point out the sufficient grounds for police remand against the accused.'' He remanded Luthra to judicial custody till November 13.

In Sharma's case the MM said that ``the custody of the accused with the police is absolutely necessary to unfold the suspense which shrouds the entire incident'' and sent him to five days police custody.

A dishevelled and unshaven Sharma was next brought to the court of MM Narain. In his complaint (FIR no. 867/98) to the Hauz Khas police, Sanjay Sabharwal alleged that Sharma had illegally taken over his C-41 Anand Niketan property in south Delhi. The defence lawyers had argued that Sabharwal had earlier filed a similar case (FIR no. 538/96) with the Connaught Place police in 1996. When the MM questioned Sabharwal, he had told him that he had filed an earlier complaint but ``didn't get any relief''. The MM then asked the IO to confirm whether both the complaints were for the same offence.

The IO today explained that in the earlier FIR the complainant was one T.R. Anand who levelled charges against Sharma under Sections 420 (cheating), 468 (forgery for purpose of cheating), 471 (using as genuine a forged document) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The present FIR is registered under Sections 343 (wrongful confinement for three or more days), 348 (wrongful confinement to extort confession or compel restoration of property), 382 (theft after preparation made for causing death, hurt), 406 (criminal breach of trust), 420 (cheating) and 506 (criminal intimidation) IPC. So the MM observed: ``Therefore substance of these two FIRs is not one and the same''.

The IO said that the complainants in the two cases were also not the same. The first complaint was filed by Anand, but as Sabharwal also gave his statement to the police he was made a party. The second complaint was filed by Sabharwal.

But the magistrate also said that the defence counsel ``raises a very fundamental question that just on changing name of complainant offences cannot be categorised as two offences ... the law is settled on this point''.He remanded Sharma to three days police custody. This will begin after Sharma's other police custody remand ends.