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BBM chats with Moin Qureshi have been public for 3 years, I-T dept & ED have not added anything: ex-CBI chief

Former CBI chief AP Singh has been named with Moin Qureshi and others in an FIR registered last week.

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Former Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) chief AP Singh told ANI on Thursday that a majority the Blackberry chat messages exchanged with meat exporter Moin Qureshi were after he retired from the agency in November 2012.

"None of the purported BBMs pertain to CBI investigations. They are mostly personal and innocuous in nature as between friends," Singh told ANI. "Suffice to say these BBMs have been in public domain for over 3 years. The Income tax department and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) have not added anything further," Singh said.

The CBI had named Singh along with Moin Qureshi and others in an FIR registered last week for allegedly favouring the meat exporter after receiving a complaint from the Enforcement Directorate. The agency had carried out searches at the residence of Singh on February 20. 

ED chief Karnal Singh had alleged that in the course of investigation in a Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) case against AMQ Group of companies owned by Qureshi, it transpired that the businessman was acting as a middleman for some public servants. In his letter, the ED chief attached records of Blackberry chat messages exchanged between AP Singh and Qureshi to allege that cognizable offences were committed by the two in collusion with each other.

AP Singh, during whose tenure a number of charge sheets were filed in high-profile cases including the alleged fake encounters in Gujarat of Sohrabuddin Sheikh, Sadiq Jamal and Tulsi Prajapati, said majority of the messages were exchanged after he had retired from the CBI on November 30, 2012. In Sheikh and Prajapti case, BJP leader Amit Shah was charge sheeted by the CBI. Shah was also arrested by the CBI but was later given bail. Shah was discharged in the Sheikh encounter case by the Special Court in December, 2014, six months after BJP-led government came to power and the CBI did not appeal against the discharge order.

Out of the messages exchanged between him and Qureshi, only three belong to the period when AP Singh was the Director in which the meat exporter had sought "help" for a family friend. However, AP Singh had informed Qureshi that the case had been charge sheeted and that his friend should approach the courts for relief, according to the messages cited by ED.

All the remaining messages were exchanged after he had retired from the CBI and there is no overt attempt to seek help for anyone, Singh claimed.

The ED, surprisingly, had not named Singh in its Enforcement Case Information Report ED Assistant Director Arun Kumar, whose complaint was also attached with Karnal Singh's letter, alleged that Qureshi took "huge money" from different persons for obtaining undue favours from public servants and politicians holding high offices.

The ED has appended 22 BBM messages which were exchanged between A P Singh and Moin Qureshi even after the retirement of the IPS officer. A perusal of the complaint shows that neither Karnal Singh nor Arun Kumar have given any details about specific transactions which, they believe, might have taken place between AP Singh and Qureshi.

The ED has also not specified in its complaint which specific favours were given by AP Singh and how he was benefited from Qureshi. The complaint takes the name of Qureshi but only talks about senior officials and politicians in generic terms. 

With ANI and PTI inputs.

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