Chandigarh, May 9
Taking a serious view of the remarks made by the Chief Director of the Vigilance Bureau about investigations in the PPSC scam, the Intelligence Wing today affirmed that it would continue to provide inputs to the government as an aid to further investigations in the recruitment scam and other related cases, holding that efforts would continue to be made to rectify any aberration as and when detected.

Maintaining that some major inputs, including the trap of the prime accused Ravi Sidhu, arrest of Jagman Singh (main associate of Ravi Sidhu), recovery of over Rs 14 crore from bank lockers and saving bank accounts and the latest arrest of Randhir Singh Gill, alias Dhira, were its contributions, a spokesman of the Intelligence Wing said today it was necessary for the wing to ensure that the investigations were put on a firm footing and proceeded on the right lines.

Tracing the history of the case, the spokesman maintained that complete transparency has been maintained as it was necessary to inspire public confidence and credibility in the investigations of a scam of this dimension in order to take the investigations to a logical conclusion. Transparency serves as a self-imposed check against malpractices.

Randhir Singh Gill, alias Dhira, the main tout of Ravi Sidhu, had voluntarily surrendered himself before the Intelligence Wing where he was examined by a team of officers. The disclosures made by him were noted and he was handed over to the Vigilance Bureau for legal action.

The Additional Director-General of Police-cum- Chief Director of Vigilance Bureau, Mr A.P. Pandey, had been briefing the media and also appearing on the electronic media. In the case of Randhir Singh Dhira, however, he chose to make only selective disclosures.

Sources in the Intelligence Wing informed that this had led to a perception in certain quarters that malpractices may occur in future investigations. As a safeguard, the Intelligence Wing briefed the Press fully, the next day, regarding the information brought out by Randhir Singh Dhira, based on his examination by officers of the wing. Standing by what it had disclosed to the Press at its briefing, sources said it was made clear to the media that the disclosures were subject to verification upon further investigation.

Referring to the statement of Mr A.P. Pandey regarding the recovery of Rs 13 lakh, sources in the Intelligence Wing said it was necessary to clarify that apart from the money recovered from the bank lockers, it was found that Rs 1.11 crore in cash had been earlier removed from the lockers by Jagman Singh and his friend Dheerender Walia. A joint team of the Vigilance Bureau and Patiala district police was deputed to recover it.

The Patiala police was associated as an elementary measure of keeping a check since a large amount of cash was involved. In spite of this, the Intelligence Wing later learnt that the entire amount had not been recovered.

The Intelligence Wing had to intervene and the SSP, Patiala, and the DSP, Dera Bassi, were directed to take steps to effect the recovery of the remaining amount of Rs 13 lakh, which was with Dheerender Walia. The amount had been fully recovered.