A Special court here on Saturday extended the police custody of Principal Secretary of the Chhattisgarh government, B. L. Agrawal, and two others for three days in connection with a bribery case.
Besides Mr. Agrawal, Special CBI Judge Virender Kumar Goyal also extended the custody of alleged middleman Bhagwan Singh and the officer’s relative Anand Agarwal after the probe agency said they were required to be confronted with another accused arrested in the case.
The fourth accused, Syed Burhanuddin, claims to be posted at the Prime Minister’s Office.
‘Crucial stage of probe’
During the hearing, the CBI claimed that the probe was at a crucial stage and the chain of hawala transactions was yet to be established. It was investigating if any other public servant was involved in the case.
The CBI has alleged that the 1988-batch IAS officer wanted to “settle” an ongoing CBI probe against him.
It further alleges that the officer is facing investigation in two cases registered in 2010 when he was the Health Secretary in the State government. He has been chargesheeted in one, while the probe is going on in the other.
The officer had approached Mr. Singh, a resident of Noida, who took him to Mr. Burhanuddin to get a graft case “settled”.
Mr. Burhanuddin, who has many aliases, claimed that he was working in the PMO and would help him settle the case in his favour.
Mr. Burhanuddin had allegedly demanded ₹1.5 crore for his services, the CBI has said.
