Vyapam case: Congress to file private complaint, deploy its lawyer leaders, says Kapil Sibal

The CBI on Tuesday said that there was “no grain of truth in the allegation’’ made by senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh that a hard disk seized in the Vyapam case had been tampered with to remove Chouhan’s name.  Digvijaya had alleged that the hard disk, seized from main accused Nitin Mahindra, had been doctored to scrub out “CM” with “M/S” to save Chouhan.

Several persons had committed suicide after the case broke in 2013. The Congress, however, cannot challenge the chargesheet filed by the CBI since it is not a party in the case.  The option before the party is to file a criminal complaint under Section 200 of CrPC. The CBI overlooked evidence, the Congress is likely to contend in its complaint. “We have evidence to prove the entire chain of events,” Tankha said.

Read | Vyapam case: CBI cites private lab statement countering Digvijaya Singh’s claim

The MP government or the CBI can challenge the Congress’s complaint on “two or three grounds”, including that the complaint has no cause of action or material, a senior lawyer, who is a Congress leader, said. “That ex-facie will not stand because we will furnish material,” the lawyer-leader, who did not want to be named, said.

Addressing the media at the Congress headquarters, Sibal said the CBI is targeting only opposition party leaders.  The CBI, quoting forensic findings, has said the disk was last switched off on July 15, 2013, and its records were not accessed thereafter. All the five ‘Excel’ files with reference to “CM’’ were created or modified after July 18, 2013, it said.

Sibal said: “The CBI says… they sent it (disk) to CFSL-Gujarat on July 22. They have said the disk was switched off on July 15. But the reality is that on July 17…DSP Dilip Soni handed over the hard disk to the I-G. The Commissioner and Anand Rai (whistleblower in the case) were present. Rai has given an affidavit regarding this in the court…If the CBI says the hard disk was seized on July 18, then how did it reach the I-G’s office on July 17? That means the hard disk had been seized earlier…and the manipulation was done between July 17 and July 18.”