ATS may approach court over plea for CBI inquiry

The Anti-Terrorism Squad officials may approach the court in connection with self-styled hacker Manish Bhangale demanding a CBI investigation in the Dawood-Khadse call log case. ATS officials have also alleged that Mr Bhangale has not appeared before the investigators to submit and verify his data.

This comes a day after Mr Bhangale, through his lawyer, had sent a letter to the commissioner of police and chief minister regarding newly appointed ATS chief Atulchandra Kulkarni. In his letter, Mr Bhangale’s lawyer stated, “‘apprehension in being killed by your official henchmen (Mr Kulkarni’s) and he also doesn’t want to appear before you as you have suspicious bonafides.”

When contacted, Mr Kulkarni said his officials had gone to Jalgaon to issue summons to Mr Bhangale. “Our officer had been in touch with him and since he doesn’t have any such permanent address in Mumbai, we had to go to Jalgaon to hand him the summons,” said Mr Kulkarni. “But he has not responded to the summons nor has he told us when he will be handing us the data.”

Mr Bhangale, who alleged death threats to himself and his family and attempts to sabotage the data gathered by him, recently filed a petition in the high court demanding a CBI enquiry into the Dawood-Khadse call log issue. He said that while he had accessed the data by hacking into Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) at the cost of his life, the Mumbai police was not taking it seriously and was attempting to save the (now former) minister Eknath Khadse.

“If the court accepts the petition, then we are planning to intervene. We have not been given a chance to investigate the case and the person is not even ready to give the data. So before we are even given the data, how can he demand a CBI enquiry,” said an officer. He added that that repeated changes in timeline of the data has also delayed the process.

ATS officials said Mr Bhangale was not cooperating with their investigation. “He says he has met Crime Branch officers but we don’t know who these officers are. Also, now the investigation is with the ATS so he will have to submit and explain the data again to us. Which he is delaying and is reluctant to do,” said another officer.