Orissa chit fund scam: CBI questions DIG Rajesh Kumar

Till a few months ago, Kumar himself was investigating chit fund companies — including Seashore — in the state. On Sunday, he reached the CBI office in the morning and left at 12.40 pm. The CBI has so far interrogated and arrested builders, mediapersons, politicians and Seashore executives in connection with the case.

CBI sources said that Kumar was questioned about his links to Subhankar Nayak, a broker arrested by the agency last month.

Nayak allegedly helped the businesses of Seashore and Artha Tatwa by building a relationship with top IAS and IPS officers, journalists and politicians of the ruling BJD.

On Sunday, Kumar only said, “I have told the CBI whatever I had to tell them.”

It is learnt that Kumar’s name figured in diaries, envelopes and other documents seized by the CBI from Nayak’s apartment in Bhubaneswar on November 18.

According to the list of seized articles, submitted to the special CBI court and accessed by The Indian Express, a bunch of 12 envelopes contained the names of some officers and advance payments purportedly made to them. Kumar’s name figured in this list. The list also refers to DIG/SBP (Sambalpur, northern range) and SP Dhenkanal, but without giving any name or year.

Later in the evening, Kendrapara SP Satish Gajbhiye was interrogated for about two-and-a-half hours by the CBI. Gajbhiye’s name came up in Nayak’s diary as SP Dhenkanal, it is learnt. Before his transfer to Kendrapara, Gajbhiye was SP in Dhenkanal district. Sources said Nayak allegedly invested in Gajbhiye’s crusher unit.

According to CBI sources, Kumar was interrogated on suspicion of derailing the chit fund probe.

The 1998-batch officer, the first IPS to be questioned in connection with the scam, investigated more than a dozen chit fund companies — including Seashore — in the past two years as the DIG of Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the CID. He took over as north-central range DIG more than a month ago. As head of the EOW, he was leading the chit fund investigation till the CBI took over the probe under orders from the Supreme Court.

Apart from Kumar, the list submitted to the court mentions the name of Anu Garg, the official in the PMO who was earlier secretary in Orissa’s health and family welfare department.

Garg could not be reached for comment despite repeated attempts. Her husband Saurabh Garg, also a 1991-batch IAS officer who is now in the Ministry of Finance, told The Indian Express over phone that his wife is on tour in “some interior areas of the Northeast and hence inaccessible”.

The seized documents also have a “Government of Orissa 2011 diary”, which has details of payments purportedly made by Seashore to the then collector of Sambalpur, SPs of Dhenkanal, Keonjhar, Sundergarh and Baleswar, DIG Sambalpur and others. Another diary with a 2009 date contains names of several persons, including IAS and IPS officers, MPs and MLAs. CBI sources said Nayak, too, revealed the names of these officials and politicians during interrogation.

CBI sources said that Nayak’s interrogation revealed that he had unfettered access to the state’s IAS and IPS officials. Several IPS officials are learnt to have attended his family functions while an IPS-IAS couple now on central deputation treated him like ‘family’. CBI sources said that many of these officials would be called in for interrogation.

The seizure list also includes 12 other envelopes, which contain the names of some other officers, including the inspector of a police station in Bhubaneswar and several low-level government officials.

The CBI had seized several passbooks and chequebooks of various banks from Nayak’s premises. They also seized 14 ATM cards, two gold biscuits of 50 grams each and Rs 14,63,450 in cash.