CBI defends transfer of Joint Director

In its response to a plea moved by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy, the agency has called Swamy’s claims as “baseless and misleading” about a likely transfer of another officer, Additional Director R K Dutta. It has maintained that Dutta was still in place to supervise the investigation and that in fact a proposal has been sent by CBI Director Anil Sinha to the government for promoting Dutta as a Special Director in the agency.

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On an application moved by Swamy, who is one of the petitioners in the 2G cases, a bench headed by Chief Justice H L Dattu had sought an explanation from the CBI on the shifting of the two officers. The court is monitoring the investigations into the cases, and it had earlier stopped the CBI from reshuffling its officers involved in these probes.

Swamy, in his plea, had alleged that the senior officers were shifted soon after former Finance Minister P Chidambaram was questioned in the Aircel-Maxis scam. A week after questioning Chidambaram in December, Tewari was reassigned to head the agency’s Multi-Disciplinary Monitoring Agency, in connection with probes on the conspiracy angles of Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.  He had told the bench that just a day before the hearing, the CBI had repatriated him to his parent cadre, Himachal Pradesh.

In its affidavit that would come up for hearing on Monday, the CBI has however stuck to its guns on repatriation of Tewari and snubbed the argument that his shifting would impact the probe. “The investigation is not at all imperilled by his transfer. Further, because of administrative reasons including empanelment of higher posts, tenure at Centre, other administrative exigencies in the CBI, the superior officers at the level of Joint Director/Additional Director/Special Director have to be shifted or given new assignments. But to construe that these would imperil the ongoing investigation is unfounded,” it said.

The CBI stated that officers at supervisory levels had kept changing since the inception of the probe in 2009 and Tewari happened to be the third Joint Director in succession, supervising the 2G probe. By the time Tewari joined, probes relating to Swan-Etisalat and Aircel Maxis scams had already reached an advanced stage of trial, as per the affidavit.

It also disclosed that while former CBI Director Ranjit Sinha had favoured an extension of Tewari’s tenure by another two years following his five year-deputation in the agency in December last, his successor Anil Sinha recommended an extension only till March 31. By an administrative order of reshuffling seven Joint Directors on February 3, Anurag Garg replaced Tewari.  The CBI has said there was nothing wrong with its administrative decisions.

Regarding proposed transfer of Dutta, the CBI has said Swamy’s apprehensions were based on conjectures and that he was still supervising the probes.

Further, after the officer’s empanelment as the DGP, the agency wanted him promoted to the post of Special Director in the CBI itself.  The affidavit has been filed by CBI SP Vivek Priyadarshi.