YSR Congress president Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy will be grilled for two more days by the CBI as its petition was allowed by Justice B. Chandra Kumar of the AP High Court on Friday. He will be questioned from 10.30 a.m. to 5 p. m in the presence of two advocates.
After the end of his five-day police custody on Thursday, the CBI filed a petition seeking custody of Mr. Jagan for two more days. Justice Chandra Kumar asked the counsel for CBI “what is that you have done for the last ten months.” Mr. Ashok Bhan, senior counsel for the CBI, said that the conspiracy had spread to foreign countries and had a long trail. The judge said that five days was not a short period and if the CBI had not achieved anything so far, it could hardly get fresh information in two days.
New material
The CBI counsel said that Mr. Jagan was being evasive and trying to pass the buck. The agency had new material with which to confront him. The judge cut him short by saying ‘do not enter into all that' when the counsel went on to say that the Kadapa MP had used his father's name and amassed wealth. He pointedly asked what the special circumstances were to warrant the custody of Mr Jagan for two more days.
Mr. Bhan said Mr. Jagan had to be confronted with the depositions of some persons as he was clever. Upon which, the judge remarked ‘everyone is clever.' The counsel reminded the judge that in the remand order passed by the court the judge had felt that in-depth inquiry was needed to unearth the ill-gotten money.
‘Sweeping remarks'
Mr. C. Padmanabha Reddy, senior advocate appearing for Mr. Jagan, said all these were sweeping remarks and raised the question of the maintainability of the petition. The petition filed for remand had already been disposed of and the present one amounted to reviewing the earlier order.
Taking into consideration the CBI's plea that new material had come to light and Mr. Jagan needed to be confronted with it, Justice Chandra Kumar said that the High Court has power to order further custody and it is not a review.
