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Goa cops return after quizzing 3 Tehelka staffers
Tribune News Service

Tejpal may seek transfer of probe A three-member Goa police team quizzed Tehelka Managing Editor Shoma Chaudhury and three employees who had been contacted by the victim to corroborate her version. The team returned to Panaji without questioning Tejpal who may be contemplating moving court and seeking probe by an independent agency. The police seized from Tehelka office a hard disc, transcripts of emails exchanged among Tejpal, Choudhury and the victim and other documents

New Delhi, November 24
The three-member Goa Police team probing the alleged sexual assault case against Tarun Tejpal returned today without questioning the Tehelka editor himself. The team, however, quizzed three employees of the magazine who were contacted by the victim to corroborate her version. A hard disc and some documents were seized by the team.

As the Goa Police did not rule out the possibility of pressing additional charges against the Tehelka editor, Tejpal was said to be planning to move court to get the case against him transferred from the Goa Police to an independent agency.

Media reports had earlier quoted him as saying that the victim was lying and that he was being framed. He also alleged that “political forces are driving much out of it”.

The Goa Police team, which reached Delhi yesterday, questioned Tehelka managing editor Shoma Chaudhury for around nine hours at the magazine’s office in Greater Kailash-II, South Delhi.

The team took into custody the e-mail exchanges among Chaudhury, the woman journalist and Tejpal, the CPU of a computer and some documents.

Goa DIG OP Mishra confirmed that his police team had not established contact with Tejpal as yet, but they had questioned other people related to the case.

Addressing mediapersons in Goa, Mishra said they had recorded several statements and seized electronic items deemed to be important to the case. He appealed to the media and the public to stop sharing details of what had happened to the victim, including the emails she is believed to have written to Shoma Chaudhury, with explicit details of what happened to her.

“Yesterday, at the Tehelka office, the Goa Police took my deposition for about 9 hours. It was an extremely courteous experience and I fully cooperated and showed every document that was relevant, every email exchange that was there between my colleagues, the management, it was shared, it was a good experience and I hope it helps bring clarity and justice to the entire case,” Chaudhury said. In a parallel development, the National Commission of Women (NCW) has asked the Mumbai Police to provide security to the victim while stressing that the woman journalist should come forward and put up her case firmly.

Earlier in the day, the Goa Crime Branch team led by Deputy Superintendent of Police Sammy Tavares recorded statements of the three colleagues of the victim with whom she had interacted soon after the alleged assault at a Goa hotel around a fortnight ago.