Saradha case: Rajeev Kumar fails to appear before CBI for second time in three days; don't know his whereabouts, say top West Bengal officials

Kolkata: Former city police commissioner Rajeev Kumar defied Central Bureau of Investigations (CBI’s) summons to turn up at the agency’s Kolkata office on Monday for the second time in three days to face interrogation in connection with the multicrore Saradha chit fund scam. [caption id=“attachment_6021671” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar. Image courtesy News18[/caption] West Bengal chief secretary, home secretary and the director general of police later in the day replied to the probe agency’s querry about Kumar’s continued absence from appearing before its sleuths, sources in the state secretariat said. The CBI had directed Kumar, currently the additional director general of police in the criminal investigation department (CID), to appear before its officials by 2 pm Monday, but he did not turn up at CGO complex office of the CBI. This was the second occasion since Saturday last week that Kumar defied the investigating agency’s summons. The CBI officials had gone to the state secretariat on Saturday and handed over a letter for the state Director General of Police Veerendra directing Kumar to appear before the CBI officials at 2 pm on Monday. Two CBI officials went there on Monday morning again and delivered letters to Chief Secretary Malay De and Home Secretary Alapan Bandyopadhyay in connection with Kumar’s failure to appear before the agency on Saturday. In the letters the probe agency sought to know the whereabouts of the police officer and the grounds on which he had gone on a month-long leave and when would he be joining duty, a senior official at the state secretariat told PTI. The orders of the Calcutta High Court withdrawing protection against arrest to Kumar were also attached with the letters. Replying to CBI’ s queries on Kumar, chief secretary Malay De, Home Secretary Alapan Bandyopadhyay and DGP Virendra have said that the top police officer has gone on a leave till 25 September  on personal grounds and his whereabouts during this period was not divulged to them, the sources said. In similar replies the three top officials said they have no clue why Kumar’s mobile number was unreachable. CBI had served fresh notice to Kumar on Friday after the HC withdrew his protection against arrest and had asked him to appear before it on Saturday. But Kumar had defied the summons . CBI officials had gone to the secretariat on Sunday to serve the letters but had been told to come back on a working day. They had submitted the letters meant for the DGP. Kumar, who reports to the DGP, had sent an e-mail to CBI seeking a months time to appear stating that he is on leave for personal reasons till 25 September. He was part of a special investigation team (SIT) set up by the state government to investigate the Saradha chit fund scam before the Supreme Court handed over the case to the CBI in 2014 along with other similar ones. CBI said that Kumar had allegedly suppressed evidences crucial for filing the final chargesheet in the Saradha scam. The Saradha group of companies had allegedly duped lakhs of people of Rs 2500 crore, promising higher rates of returns on their investments.