Peter Mukerjea’s foreign deals being probed

Sources say CBI is looking into banking transactions carried out in UK, France

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), according to highly placed sources, is looking into all banking transactions of former media baron Peter Mukerjea, now in its custody, that were carried out in France and the United Kingdom.

The CBI, on Friday, had asked for Peter’s custody from the Esplanade court to look into all his financial transactions. At the time, Peter’s lawyer had claimed that Peter and his deceased stepdaughter Sheena Bora did not have any banking transactions. However, the public prosecutor for the CBI, additional solicitor general of India Anil Singh, argued that it wanted to find out if there are, indeed, any banking transactions between Sheena and Peter and whether this was the link or motive behind him conspiring with the other chargesheeted accused.

There were reports in the media that Peter might have parked a huge amount of money in Sheena’s bank account, which she later refused to return. Sheena is the daughter of Peter’s wife Indrani from Siddharth Das. After ending her relation with Das, Indrani married Sanjiv Khanna. After breaking up with Khanna, Indrani married Peter.

The CBI is checking the banking transactions for a few years before Sheena’s murder. While CBI is checking this particular point of ‘money laundering’ against Peter, its chargesheet filed against Indrani, her driver Shyamvar Rai and Khanna cites another reason as the motive for Sheena’s murder.

The chargesheet mentions that Indrani did not like the relationship between Sheena and Peter’s son Rahul, who were in love and were to get married.

Sources said, “Sheena wanted a huge flat from Indrani. On the other hand, Indrani didn’t want Sheena and Rahul to get married, as she would have ended up losing all her property to Sheena. Also, Indrani had introduced Sheena to everyone as her sister and the truth came to light only after Sheena’s murder surfaced in 2015.”