The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the conviction of former Maharashtra minister Manikrao Kokate in a 1995 document tampering and fraud case, Live Law reported.

The stay means that the leader from the faction of the Nationalist Congress Party headed by Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar will not be disqualified as an MLA while the case is being heard.

A bench of Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi passed the order on a plea filed by Kokate challenging a Bombay High Court order that had suspended his sentence but not stayed his conviction.

However, the Supreme Court said that Kokate will not be able to hold an office of profit while the matter is heard.

In February, a trial court held Kokate and his brother guilty of fraudulently acquiring flats in the Nirman View Apartment in Nashik’s Yeolekar Mala in 1995 under a government scheme by misrepresenting their income.

They had been sentenced to two years’ imprisonment and fined Rs 50,000. The court subsequently granted the Sinnar MLA bail.

The trial court held that Kokate and his brother acquired the flats by forging documents to falsely show that they belonged to the low-income group and their annual income to be below Rs 30,000, which enabled them to secure flats under the chief minister’s 10% discretionary quota.

However, on Monday, Bagchi was quoted as saying by Live Law that there was a fundamental error in the conviction. The judge observed that a “false declaration does not make a document forgery (sic)”.

On Thursday, Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis accepted Kokate’s resignation as a minister after the Nashik District and Sessions Court upheld the conviction and issued an arrest warrant against him.

Under the law, a public representative sentenced to two or more years in prison cannot remain in office.