CBI again questions Kejriwal's PS Rajendra Kumar

Under attack over its raids at the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's office building, CBI today justified the action saying the list of all the files seized will be placed before the court even as it continued questioning his Principal Secretary in a corruption case.

The agency's action yesterday evoked sharp reaction from Kejriwal who accused it of searching files "unrelated" to the probe against his Principal Secretary Rajendra Kumar and claimed that a file relating to DDCA was scrutinised by it.

"CBI kept reading DDCA file in my office.They wud hv seized it. But after my media briefing, they left it. Not clear if they took a copy. Docs seized from my office.No relation to allegations being probed.Item 7-file movement register of last one month," he said in a series of tweets.

Jaitley had yesterday dismissed the allegations against him as "rubbish".

Kejriwal also uploaded image of a document listing the files allegedly taken away by CBI from Delhi Secretariat during its day-long raid yesterday.

"CBI seizures during the searches at all 14 places, were in the presence of independent witnesses, as per the procedures laid down by the law. The search cum seizure memo containing details of all seized items will be produced before the competent court," agency spokesperson Devpreet Singh said.

The agency sources claimed that it has recovered documents pertaining to bank balances of approximately Rs 28 lakh from Kumar, a 1989-batch IAS officer from AGMUT cadre, who is facing probe for allegedly favouring a private firm in government contracts.

The documents pertaining to fixed deposits worth Rs 1.66 crore were allegedly found from A K Duggal, former MD, ICSIL, CBI sources claimed.

The agency carried out second round of questioning Kumar this morning.

The IAS officer arrived at the CBI building at around 9.40 AM for the questioning in connection with the case registered against him and six others on December 14.

Kumar was questioned by the CBI for about seven hours late last night after the probe agency sleuths raided his Delhi Secretariat office, triggering a political storm between Delhi government and the Centre.

The CBI said that it has registered a case against Kumar and others on allegations against the officer that he abused his official position by "favouring a particular firm in the last few years in getting tenders from Delhi government departments".

Kumar has been booked under 120-B of IPC (criminal conspiracy), and 13(2), 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act (Criminal conspiracy, criminal misconduct etc) for allegedly favouring a private company in five contracts worth Rs 9.5 crore during 2007-14.

CBI carried out searches at 14 places connected with Kumar in the national capital, including his residence, and various locations in Uttar Pradesh.

The agency has claimed to have recovered about Rs 16 lakh, including Rs 2.4 lakh in cash, foreign currency of the value of Rs 3 lakh from the residence of Kumar.

"The allegations against Kumar were raised by Ashish Joshi, former Member Secretary, Delhi Dialogue Commission (DDC)," the CBI said.

As opposition attacked the Centre over the CBI action, the agency went on an overdrive to convey that the raids were being undertaken after following a due a process of law which included getting a search warrant from the competent court.

Kejriwal had yesterday called Prime Minister Narendra Modi a "psychopath" and "coward" after the raids and targeted Finance Minister Arun Jaitley over alleged corruption in Delhi's cricket body under his watch. BJP demanded that Kejriwal must apologise for his remarks against Modi.