An apex court bench headed by Chief Justice HL Dattu said that all four will be released on bail subject to the satisfaction of the condition by the trial court.
The court made it clear that Jayalalithaa and three others will complete their appeal with all relevant documents before the high court in a matter of two months and thereafter, it will ask the high court to expedite and complete the hearing on the appeal within three months.
The court told senior counsel Fali S Nariman, appearing for Jayalalithaa, that it will not grant a day more to his client if they don't complete the paperwork of their appeal before the high court with all the documents within a span of two months.The AIADMK leader was convicted and sentenced for four years and fined Rs 100 crore for disproportionately amassing about Rs 66 crore outside her known sources of income.
The former Tamil Nadu chief minister was on October 7 refused bail by the Karnataka High Court, which held that there were no grounds for grant of bail to the AIADMK leader.
Justice A.V. Chandrashekara, who heard Jayalalithaa's petition, also declined to suspend her four-year jail term even after Special Public Prosecutor G. Bhavani Singh submitted he had no objection to her bail application.
Jayalalithaa invoked section 389 of the Code of Criminal Procedure seeking the suspension of her sentence and grant of bail till the pendency of her appeal against the trial court order convicting her and sentencing her to four years in jail.
"No sufficient grounds for suspension of the sentence. The Supreme Court clearly indicated that corruption violates human rights and leads to economic imbalance," the judge said in his interim order.
The judge also found no prime facie ground for granting bail to the 66-year-old Jayalalithaa.
Noted jurist Ram Jethmalani appeared for Jayalalithaa as defence counsel.
The bail petitions of Jayalalithaa's associates - former close associate Sasikala Natarajan, estranged former foster son V.K. Sudhakaran and former aide J. Ilavarasi - were also rejected on the same grounds.
Earlier, in his 90-minute deposition, Jethmalani assured the judge that his client (Jayalalithaa) would abide by any condition put forth for bail, as she was a law abiding citizen and would not flee the country.
But this argument cut no ice with the judge.
A special court here Sep 27 convicted Jayalalithaa for corruption when she was chief minister in 1991-96 and jailed her for four years of simple imprisonment.
She was also fined Rs.100 crore under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Prevention of Corruption Act.
The other three were also sentenced to four years in jail and fined Rs 10 crore each.
The bail petitions were posted for hearing by a regular bench Tuesday by a special bench of the high court Oct 1.
