Criminal Investigation Department (CID) sleuths have reportedly questioned a woman IAS officer, a batchmate of D.K. Ravi, who was the last person to speak to him before he died on Monday.
Call records made available to The Hindu by government sources appear to confirm that Ravi called the officer at 11:12 a.m. and spoke to her for 16 seconds. Sources say this last call and other calls to the woman IAS officer were crucial to the probe. The records show the two exchanged several calls the day before his death.
Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was quoted as having claimed in an interview to a Kannada newspaper that Ravi called the officer 44 times in the space an hour on the fateful day. Some senior IAS officers, who requested anonymity, wondered how the Chief Minister could reveal investigation details when the probe was still on.
Meanwhile, Cyber Forensic Lab in the city has not finished analysing Mr. Ravi’s three mobile phones and an iPad. Technicians at the lab are trying to retrieve whatsapp messages on the three mobiles and deleted data on the hard disk recovered from his office, sources say.
CID sleuths recorded the statements of Ravi’s family members in Doddakoppalu village in Tumkur district. Though the family members were initially reluctant to speak to CID officials and said they would only cooperate with CBI officials, they later relented. The statements were videographed.
A CID team also visited Ravi’s office in Koramangala and questioned the officials in his team that conducted most of the recent enforcement inspections against real estate majors.
Another team visited the Deputy Commissioner’s office in Kolar and recorded the statements of his former colleagues in the district.
Cabinet skips issue
The Karnataka State Cabinet, which took decisions on more than 60 subjects on Thursday, did not discuss Ravi’s death.
