Vijay Nair, AAP communications in-charge, sent to CBI custody till October 6

Senior Public Prosecutor Pankaj Gupta, appearing for the CBI, had moved an application seeking further four days custody while arguing that Nair was “not cooperating with the investigation” and he had to be confronted with evidence to “establish the role of other accused in this case”.

The judge said, “Why do you need his custody for four more days? What have you done in five days? You only took him to one place in Delhi. What is the guarantee that he will further cooperate with the investigation?”

Gupta told the court that the agency had confronted Nair with other witnesses in this case and that the investigation was at a crucial stage.

Senior advocate Ramesh Gupta, appearing for Nair, forcefully opposed the CBI remand, submitting that the agency had raised the same grounds for remand like their previous remand application.

“Seven times I was summoned, and I appeared before them. They arrested me saying I was not cooperating… What is the cooperation? Should I blame the deputy CM, (say) that he was responsible?” Gupta told the court.

He also submitted that the case diary in this matter was not paginated. Gupta said that a “human attitude is required to be applied by the judge while dealing with remand”.

He told the court that further custody can only be given if it is impossible for the agency to conduct further investigation. “This is an economic offence, why arrest. You could have called me to investigate. This was to humiliate me, harass me. There was no mistreatment (of Nair in custody), but police custody is torture… Humiliation is also torture,” Gupta submitted.

SPP Gupta told the court that he agrees with the principles of natural justice raised by Nair’s lawyers and said that they were trying their best to investigate the case. “We know unnecessarily police custody should not be asked. In 10 days, we can’t investigate. We can’t wave a magic wand,” he told the court.

The CBI has alleged that Nair was actively involved in the formulation of the Delhi government’s liquor policy for the year 2021-22. It alleged that Nair was involved in “meeting with the other co-accused and liquor manufacturers as well as distributors in different hotels at Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi for arranging ill-gotten money through hawala operators/channels”.