CBI interim chief defends wife’s financial deals: ‘Question of any unaccounted money does not arise’

Records showed that between the financial years ending 2012 and 2014, Sandhya had given loans amounting to Rs 1.14 crore to AMPL in three tranches — Rs 35.56 lakh in FY’12, Rs 38.27 lakh in FY’13 and Rs 40.29 lakh in FY’14.  READ | CBI interim chief’s wife gave Rs 1.14 crore to firm, says Registrar of Companies

In his defence, Rao said, “In 2010, my wife Smt. Mannem Sandhya took a loan of Rs 25 lakhs from M/s Angela Mercantile Pvt Ltd, owned by Shri Praween Agarwal, a long time family friend. This sum was used in joint purchase of a property in Guntur, AP. Smt Mannem Sandhya later in the year 2011 sold her ancestral agricultural land of 11-17 acres for a sum of Rs 58.62 lakhs and transferred it to M/s Angela Mercatile Pvt. Ltd. which after deducting the loan amount of Rs 25 lakhs, and adding interest, a sum of Rs 41,33,165 was returned to Smt. Mannem Sandhya in July 2014. Due intimations were given to competent authorities immediately.”

“Therefore, the question of any unaccounted money does not arise at all,” he said, adding that complete details of his and his family’s properties have been submitted in his Annual Property Returns to the Government for all years. “Lastly, I deny all other reports as they are incorrect and untrue,” he said.

Speaking to The Indian Express, Kolkata-based Praween Agarwal, listed in RoC records as a director of AMPL, had said: “She (Sandhya) is the wife of our dear family friend (Rao). I know him (Rao) for a long time, when he was an officer in Odisha. They are like our family. What is wrong if you give loans or accept some investment from a person you know as your family friend?”

A CBI spokesperson had declined to comment when contacted asked on the transactions recorded by the RoC between Rao’s wife and AMPL.

An Odisha-cadre IPS officer, Rao assumed charge as interim CBI director last Tuesday night after Director Alok Verma was asked to go on leave along with the agency’s Special Director Rakesh Asthana following a bitter fallout between the two. Rao was in the CRPF between 2008 and 2011. He returned to Odisha in 2012 before being posted at the Centre as CBI Joint Director in April 2016.