Searches at the residence of the Central Bureau of Investigation inspector, who was arrested along with a Superintendent of Police by an internal vigilance team for allegedly receiving bribes from a businessman for settling a land dispute, have led to recovery of Rs.25 lakh in cash and property documents.
Inspector Rajesh Karnatak and SP Vivek Dutt, who was probing one of the 11 coal block allocations cases, were on Saturday produced in a court, along with Rajasthan-based businessman Dinesh Chand Gupta and his aide Rajesh Pachisia, which remanded them to three days’ CBI custody. Mr. Dutt claimed he was falsely implicated and alleged that a conspiracy was hatched to keep him out of the coal block allocation probe team. His counsel said someone was trying to destroy his client’s career. The counsel told the court that his client is being targeted and nothing has been recovered from his possession by the agency.
“He is investigating an important case under the supervision of the Supreme Court and somebody wants him not to be part of the probe team... This is simply a ploy to divert the attention so that the investigation in the coal scam is vitiated,” the counsel said.
The CBI prosecutor countered by asking: “Can we do injustice to our officer?...cash has been recovered, documents have been recovered and we are doing it in a fair manner and no injustice is being done.”
The prosecutor also claimed that the agency had recorded conversations between Mr. Dutt and a police officer at the Amar Colony police station. There are four independent witnesses who were present at the time when the cash was recovered from the possession of the accused, he claimed.
The CBI probe has revealed that Mr. Pachisia, who is in the computer software business, had visited Mr. Dutt at his office in the agency’s headquarters here on several occasions without making any entry in the visitors’ register and by gaining entries under a pseudonym.
The matter allegedly settled by the accused CBI officers at the behest of the two businessmen pertained to a cheating case registered against Mr. Gupta at the Amar Colony police station on April 5. It is suspected that using their influence, the two CBI officers allegedly got the FIR quashed.
