Snoopgate case: Fabindia top brass to appear before Goa Police

Fabindia officials, including its managing director and the chief executive officer, will appear before the crime branch of Goa Police in "two to four days", the company said on Wednesday.

"Over the coming two to four days, other members of the team who have been asked to attend the proceedings, including the CEO and the MD, will be meeting with the police authorities as per schedule," Fabindia said in a statement.

The manager of the store in Goa's Candolim village, where union Minister Smriti Irani has alleged a CCTV camera was intrusively placed near the trial room, will be questioned by the crime branch officials on the second successive day, it added.

"Fabindia has been in touch with the investigating team at Goa in respect to providing a direction for the appearance of all 15 officers, including the MD and CEO."

The company also said that the statements of three of the Fabindia officials had already been recorded by the investigating authorities.

Four junior employees of Fabindia were arrested last Friday but released on bail a day later by a trial court after the police could not conclusively prove that the employees had tweaked the CCTV's angle at the trial room where the minister was trying out clothes.

The quartet were booked under IPC sections 354C (voyeurism), 509 (intrusion into privacy) and IT Act section 66E (capturing, publishing image of private area of any person without his/her consent).

The store's manager, however, secured anticipatory bail.

While the crime branch is keen on questioning the Fabindia management, Goa Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar has already given the company's top brass the clean chit, blaming "womaniser" junior employees for the CCTV mischief.