Bribery case: Top I-T official sent to 5-day police custody

A special CBI court today remanded an Additional Commissioner of Income Tax department, arrested for allegedly accepting bribe, in five days of police remand.
The probe agency had sought 14-day custody of the I-T official.
The CBI had yesterday arrested C S Bharti, a 1994-batch Indian Revenue Services official, for allegedly demanding and accepting a bribe of Rs 30 lakh from a construction firm for favouring it in scrutiny of tax returns.
In its remand application, the CBI argued that Bharti used middleman for sending money through hawala channel to other countries and it was necessary to discover his modus operandi, for which his custodial interrogation is required.

The agency further argued that it was mandatory to access his call data records (CDR) for further investigation and the uncooperative nature of the accused had made it difficult to interrogate them.
CBI said it was important to interrogate the accused to unravel the corrupt nexus and to prevent the accused from tampering vital evidence because investigation in the case is at a primary stage.

Further, it argued that the documents, seized during the course of search, are yet to be scrutinised for ascertaining the exact illegal act done by Bharti, for which custodial interrogation is vital.
The agency had yesterday said Bharti had allegedly demanded Rs 30 lakh from Drishti Constructions to help it in scrutiny and assessment of its I-T returns.

After getting the input, the probe agency laid a trap, during which it was found that delivery of the bribe money was allegedly given to a third party, which was arranged by a middleman on the instructions of Bharti.
The agency nabbed the middleman and Bharti and conducted searches at various locations in Gandhinagar and Ahmedabad.