A city magistrate court has permitted the Central Bureau of Investigation’s (CBI) plea to keep the trial in abeyance in an extortion case registered at the Marine Drive police station in which former city police chief Param Bir Singh had been booked.
The case had been transferred to the CBI as per an apex court order that all cases against Singh be transferred to the central agency. Earlier, the state’s crime branch which was the investigating agency, had filed the chargesheet against some of Singh’s co-accused. Singh had not been named in the chargesheet, again as per a Supreme Court order that directed that no more chargesheets be filed against him pending its decision on his petition, in which it finally transferred all cases against him to the CBI. The trial had begun in the extortion case before the Esplanade magistrate court. The CBI had then approached the court that the trial be kept in abeyance considering the case transfer.
On Wednesday, Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Shaikh MR noted that admittedly the matter is handed over to the CBI as per the directives of the Supreme Court. The order further said that considering the facts and circumstances of the case, the trial is kept in abeyance. The magistrate further directed the crime branch to hand over all the articles, statements and documents relating to the case in its possession, to the CBI.
The case pertains to the extortion of the complainant and developer Shyamsundar Agarwal. Besides Singh, the police had booked deputy commissioner of police Akbar Pathan, police inspectors Nandkumar Gopale and Asha Korke and Agarwal’s estranged business partner Sanjay Punamiya among others as accused for extorting the builder to the extent of Rs 15 crore. The builder had complained that Punamiya had lodged 18 false police cases against him and was trying to extort him by threatening to get the stringent Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act (MCOCA) invoked against him taking Singh’s help.
