New Delhi, March 9
Arms dealer Suresh Nanda, already under scanner in defence deals, was arrested along with his son and two others for allegedly manipulating evidence in his favour in an income tax case, climaxing a chase-and-catch operation seen in Bollywood flicks.
Besides Nanda, his son Sanjeev Nanda, who is also an accused in the BMW hit-and-run case here, his chartered accountant Bipin Shah and Deputy Director of Income Tax Ashutosh Verma, an IRS officer of the 1999 batch, were arrested from a room in Marriott hotel in Juhu Mumbai last night, the CBI said.
Verma, who arrived in Mumbai from Goa last night under a cover name, checked in at the hotel under the assumed name and was closely followed by the father-son duo and Shah also under an assumed name. They were arrested when they were holding “discussion and negotiation as part of the conspiracy” to withhold certain files relating to the purchase of Barak Missile Systems from Israel in which Suresh Nanda is an accused.
While all four have been booked under Section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) and Section 201 (committing offence to cause disappearing of evidence) of the Indian Penal Code, Verma was further slapped with the charge of abusing his official position and criminal misconduct on the Prevention of Corruption Act.
As part of the deal, after receiving huge money, the official deliberately withheld and suppressed incriminating material in his possession in the investigation report prepared by him in order to save the defence middle man and his associates from an impending prosecution by the CBI and other agencies.
Immediately after arresting the four, the CBI conducted near-simultaneous searches at 12 places — six in Delhi, four in Mumbai, one each in Goa and Ghaziabad (Uttar Pradesh) — and claimed to have recovered Rs 32 lakh cash, nine computers (including the laptop of Verma) and two electronic chests.
The income tax case was registered yesterday after the Income Tax Department had conducted raids in February 2007 on the
premises held by Nandas during which documents and other material allegedly pertaining to Suresh Nanda and his associates’ involvement in different defence deals were recovered. Verma was handling the probe into that case.
All four arrested were presented before Additional Sessions Judge in Mumbai C.H.Mali, who approved the transit remand plea of the CBI and directed the agency to produce them before a designated court here within 48 hours.
Nanda, whose passport had been suspended by the government on a request from the CBI, had dragged the agency as well as the Enforcement Directorate to courts over the past one year on the plea that he was being prevented from going abroad for treatment. He is son of former Naval Chief Admiral S.M.Nanda. Though the Supreme Court had directed the CBI to hand over the passport to Nanda on January 24 last month, the agency later approached the government for suspension of the travel document under the Indian Passport Act.
Nanda has two cases pending against him for allegedly receiving kickbacks in the Rs 1150 crore Barak Missile System deal and purchase of armoured recovery vehicles.
