Bharat Shah's conviction stayed

MUMBAI: The Bombay High Court onTuesday stayed the conviction of film financier Bharat Shah in a case of allegednexus of Bollywood with underworld.Shah''s conviction was stayed byJustice D G Deshpande who heard arguments at length on an appeal filed by thefilm financier.Shah had filed an appeal against his conviction by aspecial court. The appeal was admitted by the High Court on November 11 lastyear. It will now come up for final hearing in due course.The trialcourt had on October 1 last sentenced Shah to one year RI for hiding informationfrom police about links of producer Nasim Rizvi with the underworld but set himfree as he had already served over 14 months in jail during thetrial.Shah was convicted under Section 118 of IPC which deals withhiding designs to facilitate extortion, but under MCOCA he was acquitted as thecourt did not find any evidence of his links with the underworld.Hewas, however, asked to pay Rs 5 lakh fees to the court receiver which the courtsaid would tantamount to payment of fine.Shah challenged hisconviction saying it was a stigma on his life and career and, therefore, he waschallenging the trial court''s verdict.Shah''s lawyers V R Manohar andVibhav Krishna argued that he was a director of more than 20 companies and thathe could not continue on their board unless the conviction was set aside.