RIL VP K V Mohanan suspect in documents leak case:CBI to court

CBI today told a Delhi court that Reliance Industries Ltd's Vice President (Finance) K V Mohanan and Rajendra Chitale of Mumbai-based law firm, Chitale and Associates, were "suspects" in the documents leak case.

The agency told this to Special CBI Judge S C Rajan while seeking extension of police custody of two arrested accused, chartered accountant Khemchand Gandhi and Paresh Chimanlal Budhdev, partner in Chitale and Associates.

The prosecutor told the court that Mohanan and Chitale were required to be confronted with Paresh and Gandhi to unearth the larger conspiracy among the accused persons.
The CBI also said that huge amount of money was paid to various persons in the case and they are ascertaining their identities.

"During the custodial investigation, two more suspects K B Mohanan, Vice President (Finance), RIL and Rajendra Chitale of M/s Chitale and Associates were also called today i.e. March 19 and both the suspects are required to be confronted with Khemchand Gandhi and Paresh Chimanlal Budhdev," the prosecutor said.

The counsel appearing for these two accused opposed the CBI plea contending that the agency has not given any reasons while seeking extension of police custody remand by two days.

The judge after hearing the submissions, extended the CBI custody of Gandhi and Paresh by two days till March 21.

During the hearing, four other arrested accused, Ashok Kumar Singh, Lala Ram Sharma, Daljeet Singh and Ram Niwas, were produced before the court and the CBI said that they be remanded to judicial custody as they were not required for further custodial interrogation.

The court remanded these four accused to judicial custody till April 1.

The court had on March 17 sent three government employees, Ashok Kumar Singh, Lala Ram Sharma and Daljeet Singh, Gandhi and Paresh to CBI custody till today.

The agency had earlier told the court huge incriminating documents have been seized during the probe and these accused were allegedly passing on and procuring classified and secret documents.

Ashok Kumar Singh was working as under secretary in Department of Disinvestment of the Finance Ministry, Lala Ram Sharma was a section officer in the Department of Economic Affairs and Daljeet Singh  was an upper divisional clerk in Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion of the Ministry of Commerce and Industries.

Gandhi was arrested from Mumbai on March 12 and was brought to Delhi in transit remand.

While CBI had arrested Daljeet Singh on March 16, Paresh was caught red handed on March 13 while allegedly trying to destroy troves of confidential government documents stashed in his office.

CBI had said it was a well-flourishing racket that was being operated out of Delhi with deals being fixed mostly in country's financial capital Mumbai and Bengaluru.
CBI had said Daljeet used to pass on sensitive documents to Ashok who in turn sent those documents to Gandhi.

It had alleged Ashok and Lala were passing on confidential documents to Gandhi, who is running a consultancy firm in Mumbai, in lieu of illegal gratification.

It had said that raids were conducted on March 12 at five places in Delhi, one each at Gurgaon and Mumbai and huge amount of cash and documents have been seized.
CBI's action of conducting raids and arresting accused had come on March 12 after it lodged a case of criminal conspiracy and theft under the IPC and misuse of official position under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act against them.

They were arrested for allegedly passing on confidential documents related to foreign investment policy to corporates.

CBI sources had said a trove of confidential documents and Rs 60 lakh cash were recovered from Gandhi's residence. Large number of electronic documents have been found on the laptop, tablets and hard disks recovered from the residence of the officials and CA, they had said.

It was alleged that the government servants were passing on documents related to foreign investment policies, which were being floated in the ministries, to Gandhi who in turn passed them on to big corporates for a price.

Sources had said the racket was allegedly active for last two years and may have influenced government policy regarding foreign investments in India.

They had said by getting to know that a particular foreign investment policy was being floated in the government gave the beneficiary corporate groups a time window to prepare themselves for the policy when it finally gets enforced.

They had said that this case was separate from that probed by the Delhi Police as it was proper sale of documents via a chartered accountant to the corporate groups who have interest in foreign investments.