New Delhi: Former Finance Minister P Chidambaram will shortly be produced before Delhi’s Rouse Avenue Court here Thursday after he was arrested Wednesday by the CBI in the INX media case. P Chidambaram is likely to be produced before Special MP MLA Judge Anil Kumar Kuhad.
After the dramatic sequence of events on Wednesday evening that saw the arrest of the senior Congress leader, P Chidambaram is said to have spent an almost sleepless night at the agency headquarter. He was quizzed Thursday about his involvement in the money laundering and corruption related to the INX Media case.
Officials close to the investigation, requesting anonymity, said that Chidambaram’s formal questioning started after 12 noon with CBI director Rishi Kumar Shukla himself present in the headquarter along with all the top agency officials. Most of Chidambaram’s answers have been ‘ambiguous’, many not ‘clear’ and some ‘unanswerable’.
The Delhi High Court had on Tuesday dismissed P Chidambaram’s anticipatory bail plea in both CBI and ED cases pertaining to the INX Media case.
The case relates to an FIR registered by the CBI May 15, 2017 over alleged irregularities in the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) clearance provided to INX Media for receiving overseas funds to the tune of Rs 305 crore in 2007, when Chidambaram was the Union Finance Minister. The ED had lodged a money laundering case in this regard in 2018.
The Enforcement Directorate and the CBI are probing how Chidambaram’s son Karti Chidambaram managed to get FIPB clearance in 2007 when his father was the Finance Minister. Karti was arrested February 28, 2018 by the CBI for allegedly accepting money to facilitate the FIPB clearance to INX Media. He was later granted bail. Karti Chidambaram’s chartered accountant, S Bhaskararaman, was also arrested and released on bail later.
Meanwhile Karti Chidambaram who arrived here from Chennai Thursday morning termed the arrest of his father P Chidambaram as a ‘political vendetta’ and vehemently denied any association with either Peter Mukherjea or his wife Indrani Mukherjea, the promoters of INX Media.
Karti said despite several efforts by the CBI, the agency didn’t have a case against them.
“First and foremost we are being targetted. There is no legal requirement for my father to be available to anybody… My father is a vehement, vocal and articulate critic of this government. Case has no legal basis, charges are trumped-up,” said Karti, who said that he knew the processes agencies use and never has the CBI given two hours notice to anyone.
“I have been summoned 20 times and raided four times. Nobody has ever been raided as many times but they still don’t have a case… each time I (was summoned) was given a week’s notice,” Karti informed.
When asked about his association with Peter and Indrani Mukherjea, Karti said he neither knew them nor has he met them. “I have never met Peter Mukherjea. Have never met Indrani, only time I met her was during the CBI interrogation in Byculla jail. Never met anyone in FIPB (Foreign Investment Promotion Board), don’t know the process of FIPB,” Karti asserted.
Agencies