A special CBI court on Thursday rejected a plea by the central investigation agency to close a case of the mysterious death of Karnataka cadre IAS officer Anurag Tiwari.
The special CBI court passed the order in response to a protest plea filed by Mayank Tiwari, the elder brother of the deceased young officer who was found dead on the road in Lucknow in 2017. Mayank had filed the protest application in special CBI court against the closure report seeking further investigation into the case.
The CBI had sought closure of the case saying that the allegations about the deceased were going to expose a big scam or being pressurised by senior officers or his life is under threat have not been corroborated by any oral, documentary or technical evidence.
Special Judicial Magistrate (CBI) Subrat Pathak posted the matter for September 30 asking the CBI to produce the progress report of the investigation into the case.
Anurag Tiwari, who belonged to Bahraich district of UP, was posted as civil and supplies commissioner in Karnataka and had come to Lucknow while returning from a mid-career training at Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration in Mussoorie. However, he was found dead under mysterious circumstances outside a guest house owned by the state government on May 17, 2017. The officer was staying in the same guest house.
Later, the Uttar Pradesh government had recommended a CBI probe into the case after the insistence of the family. The CBI had taken over the case on June 15 and filed its final report on February 20, 2019 stating that the IAS officer’s death was accidental and not a murder.
However, Tiwari’s elder brother Mayank challenged the CBI closure probe report in the first week of September, 2019 by filing a protest application in the special CBI court.
As per the sources, Mayank’s plea had some crucial queries such as the status of the body of the deceased who, as per the autopsy report, might have died at around 12:30 am but his body was spotted early morning around 5 am.
Mayank is reported to have also raised the query as to why did CBI not seek the assistance of an external agency in opening I-pad and Mac book of his Anurag Tiwari. Mayank also wanted to know why the probe agency was silent on finding Anurag’s second mobile phone which was still missing.
He also asked in his plea how Anurag suddenly changed his WhatsApp number at 1 am on May 17 when the autopsy reported his death around 12:30 am. Also, why his brother’s phone was busy at 5.30 am on May 17 and why the person who called from Jordan around 3.45 am was not interrogated by the probe agency.
The closure report filed by the CBI after the investigation had stated that IAS officer Anurag Tiwari was suffering from “acute gastroenteritis” on the day he died. Doctors in their written observation stated it’s medically proven that acute diarrhoea can trigger incapacitating weakness due to electrolyte imbalance, resulting in accidental fall and loss of consciousness. The report was prepared by a team of doctors from AIIMS.
Further, Mayank’s counsel Nutan Thakur also contradicted the findings of the report of the CBI wherein the agency had stated that Anurag was suffering from acute diarrhoea. She said that hours before the killing of the IAS officer he was found to be having dinner in a restaurant with another IAS officer then posted in Lucknow.