Former CBI Director Ranjit Sinha is likely to be booked for allegedly favouring controversial meat exporter Moin Qureshi during his tenure as the CBI chief during 2012-2014, highly placed sources in the Central government have revealed to The Sunday Guardian. If this happens, Sinha will be the second Director level CBI officer who will be booked for his links with Qureshi after his predecessor Amar Pratap Singh, who is facing probe by Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the CBI for his alleged links with Qureshi.
Sources revealed that the investigating agencies have got over 400 hours of call recordings of Qureshi with very influential individuals which, if brought into the public domain, may dwarf the sensation created by the “Radia tapes”.
Senior sources aware of the matter said that the ED has got a very strong evidence to prove that Qureshi was “helped” by Sinha “multiple times” in lieu of “considerations”. Sinha is already facing a CBI probe under the Prevention of Corruption Act for allegedly “scuttling” and “influencing” the probe in the coal block allocation cases.
However, sources close to Sinha have denied any wrong doing on his part and said that whatever Sinha did during his tenure was in accordance to the rule books and on the directions that he had received from his “higher bosses”.
The agencies probing Qureshi have got in their possession phone conversation records of certain individuals spanning more than 400 hours in which, according to the agency sources, it has become very clear that Sinha had extended “help” to Qureshi many times. Sources close to Sinha, have however, termed these allegations as “absurd”.
The call records also suggest that Qureshi, who was arrested on 25 August under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and is currently in the ED’s custody, was also in touch with the same “higher bosses”.
“The evidence that we have got is more than enough to prove that Sinha and Qureshi were frequently in touch over issues which should not have been shared by the CBI director with any private individual, much less with someone like Qureshi. Their personal interactions, too, took place more than 80 times, which is impossible to justify. We have documentary proof, call records and some other evidences that establish how Sinha helped Qureshi,” one of the official sources said.
Sources close to Sinha said that whatever meeting he had with Qureshi was for “official reasons”.
The agencies have also found out the links of Qureshi with certain Congress and Samajwadi Party leaders and at least two Bollywood personalities who have links with Uttar Pradesh. Qureshi’s daughter has acted in a movie, Jaanisaar, which was released in 2015.
Sources said that they have also got hold of an official letter that was sent by Sinha to the Central Board of Direct Taxes seeking details of the investigation that the CBDT was carrying out against Qureshi—this is something which Sinha was not required to do.
A former governor of a big state, too, is under the radar of the agencies for helping out a senior SP leader on the request of Qureshi in lieu of “considerations”.