Kolkata police chief grilled by CBI for 8 hours in Shillong

Kolkata: Following the Supreme Court’s order, Kolkata police commissioner Rajeev Kumar faced marathon questioning by the CBI for nearly nine hours on Saturday at Shillong in Meghalaya for his suspected role in the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam.

A four-member CBI team, including a superintendent of police-rank officer, grilled him in three rounds during which his statement was recorded.

After his questioning Mr Kumar, who is an additional director general-rank IPS officer, however, did not get any relief as he has again been summoned by the CBI to face questioning for a second time on Sunday morning when former  Trinamul  Congress Rajya Sabha MP Kunal Ghosh has also been summoned to appear and face questioning. Mr Ghosh, accompanied by his lawyer Ayan Chakraborty, has already reached Shillong.

On November 23, 2013, Mr Ghosh, a key accused in the Saradha case, was arrested by the  Bidhanngar City Police when Mr Kumar was its police commissioner.

The former CEO of Saradha Group’s media wing was then vocal agai-nst Trinamul supremo Mamata Banerjee and Mr Kumar in the case. Later the CBI grilled him on a number of occasions during which he also submitted some important documents, which he claimed to be clinching evidence of influentials’ link in the case.

To extract more details the CBI is planning to cross-examine Mr Kum-ar with Mr Ghosh on Sunday, according to sources. At around 10.45 am, Mr Kumar appeared at the CBI office.

He was accompanied by two IPS officers of the Kolkata police. They were additional police commissioner (II) Jawed Shamim and deputy commissioner of police (special task force) Murlidhar Sharma.

Besides Mr Kumar’s lawyer Bishwajit Deb, who is also a Trinamul observer in the state, was with him.

Mr Shamim, Mr Sharma and Mr Deb, however, left the CBI office soon after the Central agency’s officers clearly told them that they would not be allowed to stay there. In the beginning of the first round of questioning Mr Kumar reportedly asked the CBI to finish the session early citing that he was required to return to the city urgently to look after the law and order situation.

The CBI grilled Mr Kumar till evening. At around 7.15 pm he left without speaking to the media. It is not clear what the CBI actually asked the city top cop about but sources indicated that questions on wide ranging issues starting from his role as the head of the special investigation team before the CBI probe to collection of technical evidence were posed to him. At the last hearing in the Supreme Court the CBI had accused Mr Kumar of tampering evidence including call records, mobile phones and laptops in the case.