Saradha chit fund case: CBI moves SC against Vodafone, Airtel

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Wednesday moved the Supreme Court against two service providers--Vodafone and Airtel--for not cooperating in the probe against former Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar in connection with Saradha chit fund case.

The investigating agency claimed that the telecom majors were not providing "certain details" required for the investigation.

This comes a day after a bench of the apex court headed by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi described the status report submitted by the agency as "something very, very serious."

The apex court has also sought a reply from Kumar on the status report within a stipulated period of 10 days.

 

In the last hearing, the apex court had contended that it would determine the charges and counter-charges after hearing both the sides.

Last month, the top court had asked the investigating agency to file an affidavit, giving details about its claim that Kumar had tampered with evidence in the chit fund scam, adding that it was not "satisfied" with the oral submissions made by Attorney General Venugopal and Solicitor General Tushar Mehta.

On March 26, CBI moved an application seeking the initiation of contempt proceedings against various senior officials of West Bengal government, including the state's Director General of Police (DGP) and Kumar on the grounds of their alleged non-cooperation in its probe and destruction of evidence in the case.

In its affidavit, CBI said that there is a "larger conspiracy between highly placed state authorities and the companies under investigation" in the scam.

The affidavit also stated that the communication between CBI and state authorities which showed that there had been a "concerted effort to evade, avoid and to escape" the process of law and a conscious effort on part of the authorities to scuttle the investigation.

The plea was filed after an unprecedented chain of events on February 3 when a CBI team was detained by Kolkata Police when they reached Kumar's residence. Later, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee visited his residence. The CBI officers were taken to a police station and released later.