A Delhi court on Thursday allowed the probe agency, CBI, to interrogate the two top officials of the Commonwealth Games (CWG) organising committee (OC), Lalit Bhanot and V.K. Verma, in its custody for five days in connection with alleged irregularities in the `107-crore deal with a Swiss firm for supply of timing, scoring and result (TSR) systems.
Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) special judge Talwant Singh remanded the organising committee’s former secretary-general Bhanot and former-director general Verma to the probe agency’s custody till March 1.
Seeking seven days’ custody of Mr Bhanot and Mr Verma, the two close aides of former organising committee chief Suresh Kalmadi, the CBI, in its remand application, said that the accused duo, in criminal conspiracy with others, allegedly abused their official positions and awarded the contract to the timing company at exorbitant rates of `107 crores, in a wrongful manner.
By doing this, they restricted all competitors and thereby caused huge loss to the government exchequer and corresponding wrongful gain to the company.
Seeking a sustained custodial interrogation of the accused duo to unearth the conspiracy in the case, the CBI said the accused were “evasive and non-cooperative”.
The CBI said, “Bhanot (former secretary-general of the OC) and Verma (former director general of the OC), during the relevant period, were among the functionaries and key personnel in the OC and were deeply involved and instrumental in allotment of the contract for TSR System to Swiss Timing in a pre-planned and pre-mediated manner at an exorbitant rate.”
Opposing the plea of the CBI, senior lawyer Ramesh Gupta, appearing for Bhanot said, there was nothing to justify his client’s arrest.
Mr Gupta said, Mr Bhanot, being the secretary-general of the OC, had no role in award of contract to the Swiss Timing as he had acted on the instructions of various committees.
Later talking to reporters, after the court remanded them to five days’ CBI custody, the former CWG OC officials said, they were innocent and have been framed in the case. They have not taken a single decision while awarding any kind of contract to anybody.
Before the court proceedings, Mr Verma, while talking to reporters, said, “Media is just highlighting the case and after some time things will clear and you all will get to know the real fact.”
The court allowed both Mr Bhanot and Mr Verma to have home-cooked food on health grounds. The accused duo have been booked under sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and 420 (cheating) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and various sections of the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act.