SC to hear CBI chief Alok Verma's plea against leave order on Oct 26

A govt order surfaced today morning stating that CBI Director Alok Verma has been divested of his duties

Alok Verma on Wednesday moved the Supreme Court against a govt order that sent him on leave and relieved him of his duties as Director of CBI, according to media reports. The apex court admitted his plea and will hear the case on 26th October. 

Verma also challenged the decision to give interim charge of agency to Joint Director M Nageshwar Rao.

Amid infighting among the CBI top brass, Verma was taken off duty and replaced by Rao. His deputy, Special Director Rakesh Asthana, who is embroiled in bribery cases, has been sent on leave too, according to news agency PTI. A govt order surfaced on Wednesday morning stating the change was an interim measure. 

The government's decision to remove CBI Director Alok Verma and Special Director Rakesh Asthana is based on the CVC's recommendations, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said Wednesday, asserting that it was absolutely essential to restore the agency's institutional integrity and credibility. The Central Vigilance Commission made its recommendations last evening, he said.

According to PTI, CBI building has been sealed and neither staff nor outsiders are being allowed inside the premises.

Nageshwar Rao, Joint Director given the charge of CBI Director pic.twitter.com/kfiH3oynky

— Arvind Gunasekar (@arvindgunasekar) October 24, 2018

As reported earlier by Business Standard, a team of Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) sleuths on Monday conducted a raid on the 10th floor of its own headquarters in New Delhi while the two warring top bosses were summoned by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO). To add to the public slugfest already in play, ‘top secret’ letters by the bosses, making bribery allegations against each other, surfaced.

After the CBI filed an FIR against its Special Director Rakesh Asthana alleging that he took a bribe of Rs 30 million, the top investigating agency seems to be unravelling from the top. Several media reports have said that a letter written by Asthana to the Central Vigilance Commissioner  (CVC) alleges that he is being framed by CBI chief Alok Verma. 

The Delhi High Court on Tuesday directed the CBI to maintain status quo on the criminal proceedings initiated against Asthana, who has challenged the FIR lodged against him on bribery allegations.

Rakesh Asthana has drawn up a laundry list of cases against Director Alok Verma and other top CBI officials according to Hindustan Times. He has apparently listed a dozen charges, double the number that the CBI has him docked for. 

In a surprising and unprecedented move on October 15, the CBI has booked Special Director Rakesh Asthana and investigation officer of the case on the charges for receiving bribe from Sana through middlemen Manoj Prasad and Somesh Prasad.

The CBI has arrested Devender Kumar, the DySP and investigation officer, alleging that he had fabricated the statement of Sana purportedly claiming that a Rajya Sabha MP had met Verma on his pending case and assured him of relief and a clean chit.

Meanwhile, the entire CBI team that was investigating the case against Rakesh Asthana has been transferred with immediate effect, according to a CBI notice.

Deputy SP CBI AK Bassi, the investigating officer in the Rakesh Asthana case has been transferred to Andaman.

Similarly, all others on the team probing Rakesh Asthana namely, CBI DIG Manish Kumar Sinha, DIG Taurn Gauba, DIG Jasbir Singh, DIG Anish Prasad, DIG KR Chaurasia, HoB Ram Gopal, SP Satish Dagar, JD (P)Arun Kumar Sharma, A Sai Manohar, HoZ V Murugesan and DIG Amit Kumar have been transferred with immediate effect.