BENGALURU: The former personal assistants of Water Resources Minister D K Shivakumar and his brother D K Suresh are facing arrest in a case of illegal exchange of demonetised currency notes after a CBI special court here on Friday rejected their anticipatory bail applications.
The accused are B Padmanabhaiah, a native of T Begur in Nelamangala taluk, who was PA to D K Suresh, and S Sheshagiri, a retired public servant from Vijayanagara in Ramanagara taluk, who was PA to Shivakumar when the latter was Ramanagara district in-charge minister. The case dates back to November 2016 after the government demonetised Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes. The CBI, on May 31, had raided Suresh’s personal assistant and a few others. The search operations were conducted at five places in Bengaluru, Kanakapura and Ramanagara over allegations of illegally exchanging demonetised currency worth `10 lakh. Shivakumar and Suresh had then accused the Central government of misusing the CBI to harass them. “Intimidating tactics and arm-twisting will not work. We are ready to face any consequences,” Shivakumar had declared.
Granting anticipatory bail may hamper investigation: Court
While rejecting the bail pleas of the accused, judge S H Pushpanjali said the Union government issued notification dated November 8, 2016 for demonetisation of currency only for the purpose of public welfare and to curb black money held with some influential persons in society.
“The said notification was issued with good intention for the welfare of the entire society. Though the petitioners have stated that they were not involved in the exchange of specified bank notes, the entire allegation, including criminal conspiracy made against all the accused, is to be taken into consideration seriously,” the court said.
The court said that considering the gravity of offence alleged against the petitioners and also as the investigation is not yet completed if anticipatory bail is granted, it may hamper investigation as the custodial interrogation of petitioners may be required in future.
“Hence, I am of the opinion that the petitioners are not entitled to anticipatory bail,” the court said.
The other accused are Shivananda, a resident of Uttarahalli, Bengaluru, who was in charge of the election cell in the tahsildar’s office at Kanakapura; K Nanjappa, then first division assistant in the tahsildar’s office; S Padmarekha, then a government servant working on contract basis in Ramanagara; and Thimmaiah, a businessman and native of Thammanayakanahalli in Ramanagara taluk.
CASE HISTORY
According to the CBI, an FIR was registered against B Prakash, Chief Manager, Corporation Bank, Ramanagara, on April 7, 2017. The Corporation Bank officials left the Currency Chest Branch, M G Road, Bengaluru on November 14, 2016, along with cash of `12.25 crore and reached Ramanagara branch.
At the end of operations on that day, the branch had specified bank notes worth `10.03 lakh in excess which was not accounted for and no vouchers collected on that day, allegedly by the accused while illegally exchanging demonetised currency. Besides, discrepancies were found in the relevant register maintained by the bank officials.
The accused allegedly also generated 120 fake voter IDs, 130 DLs with the assistance of the staff working at the Election Cell of Kanakapura Taluk Office. Login card and Electoral Registration Officers’ facsimile signature, stamp, etc., were used for generation of fake voters’ ID cards, says CBI.