A Delhi court on Saturday extended the police remand of an accused in the documents theft case for three days.
Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Satish Kumar Arora extended the police remand of Lokesh Sharma, an employee of a consultancy firm, when the investigating officer of the case submitted that the names of several private secretaries and assistants of bureaucrats had come to light in the case which required to be probed.
The court had earlier remanded him to five days’ police custody.
The investigating officer also submitted that Lokesh’s further remand was required to confront him with two accused – Jitender Nagpal and Vipan Kumar – arrested in connection with the case on February 25.
Jitender Nagpal was the private secretary to a Joint Secretary in the Forest and Environment Ministry and Vipan Kumar was serving as the private secretary to a Union public Service Commission (UPSC) member. They are in police custody for five days.
There are two FIRs in the case registered by the Crime Branch of the Delhi Police.
Counsel for the accused opposed the police plea for extension of the police remand of Lokesh. His counsel said that his client had been in custody for five days and the documents had already been recovered.
The police had arrested Lokesh on February 23 alleging that “sensitive” documents pertaining to the Ministries of Coal, Power, Transport and Environment had been recovered from his possession.
So far, 16 persons have been arrested in the two FIRs.
According to the investigating officer of the documents theft case, the extended remand of the accused was needed to confront him with two other accused
