Families of Nirmal Awasthi and Virendra Pandey, who had earlier worked as personal staff for former Madhya Pradesh water resource minister Narottam Mishra and were arrested on July 26 in connection with e-tendering scam, on Friday moved High Court and demanded that the case be transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
A petition was filed in the Madhya Pradesh High Court by Awasthi's wife Amita and Pandey's wife Anita.
Nirmal and Virendra were arrested by Economic Offences Wing (EOW).
The petition seeks an investigation by CBI in the case. It further states that the investigation is being done because of the "political agenda". It has also alleged that Awasthi and Pandey are being pressurized to take Narottam Mishra's name in the case.
Soon after Awasthi and Pandey's arrests, Narottam Mishra denied any involvement in the multi-crore e-tendering scam in a statement.
"EOW is saying that it is a scam. A scam is different and e-tender tampering is different. A scam is when some transaction has taken place. They are talking about Rs 3000 crore scam but do not have any evidence of even Rs 3 crore being transacted," he said.
"This government is unnecessarily patting its back. In my time, we have raised the same issue of tampering in e-tendering. In the past eight months, this government has not been able to found even one case against us. By blaming people like us who are innocent they are setting the wrong example for the society," he added.