Chennai: After Madras High Court came down heavily on industrialists and idol theft suspects Ranvir Shah and Kiran Rao, their advocates today surrendered their passports at the Idol Wing CID Office of Economic Offences Wing in Guindy.
“On 1 November we passed a direction to surrender the passports, but so far you have not done so. You cannot take the court for a ride. So far, leniency was showed to you only because you agreed to cooperate,” a division bench of Justice R Mahadevan and Justice P D Audikesavalu said recently.
“You are involved in the alleged theft of 258 idols, you have not satisfied this court that the idols were not stolen. Most of them were temple idols which cannot be sold or purchased,” the bench told Shah’s counsel.
Apologising on behalf of the petitioners, their counsels assured the court that they were in possession of the passports and that they would surrender them to the investigating officer.