ADelhi court on Friday sentenced Delhi Assembly Speaker Goel to six months in prison in the 2015 rioting case. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA was accused of forcefully entering and raiding the house of a realtor in Vivek Vihar in Delhi in 2015, a day before the assembly elections. Ram Niwas Goel’s son Sumit Goel and four others, too, have been sentenced to six months in prison for “rioting and causing hurt” at the house of the local builder, Manish Ghai.

Ram Niwas Goel was convicted by the Delhi court on October 11 for “trespassing and voluntarily causing hurt” after he and his supporters raided Manish Ghai’s house in Vivek Vihar on Feb 6, 2015, a day before Delhi Assembly polls.

The court’s ruling stated that Ram Niwas Goel and other accused – Hitesh Khanna, Atul Gupta and Balbir Singh – are convicted of an offence under section 448 (house trespassing) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the AAP MLA’s son Sumit Goel is additionally convicted of forcefully entering the house of Manish Ghai and causing hurt.

An FIR was registered against Ram Niwas Goel following a complaint by Manish Ghai who alleged that the AAP’s Shahdara MLA and his supporters raided one of his houses in Vivek Vihar, just a day before Delhi went to polls in 2015.

A year later, Ram Niwas Goel was charge-sheeted by the Delhi Police for allegedly rioting and causing hurt at the house of the realtor. The chargesheet also named seven other people who were accompanying Ram Niwas Goel during the incident.

According to the complaint filed against Ram Niwas Goel, the AAP MLA had raided the local builder’s residence, accusing him of stashing liquor, blankets and other stuff for distribution ahead of the polls.

“As per the complainant, some labourers were staying at a house that was owned by him. He received a call from one of them at about 9.30 pm on February 6, 2015, about Goel and his associates forcibly entering the building and damaging the property,” police said.

Ram Niwas Goel, had, however, refuted the allegations. The AAP leader was on October 11 convicted in the rioting case and sentenced to six months in jail by a Delhi court on Friday.