Srinagar- The High Court of J&K and Ladakh on Wednesday ordered the Economic Offences Wing of Crime Branch Kashmir to carry further investigation related to a case regarding extorting money by instituting fake complaints against high-profile Indian businessman in different courts of Anantnag and Kulgam.
The case pertains to obtaining of non-bailable warrants and their subsequent use by accused persons for extracting money from their ‘targets’.
Rejecting demand for the probe by Central Bureau of Investigation, a bench of Justice Sanjay Dhar observed that investigating agency, police, has done fairly a good job in investigating most of the aspects of the matter and the investigation has already been handed over to a specialized agency like Economic Offences Wing of Crime Branch, Kashmir
“No such glaring and exceptional circumstances have been brought to the notice of this Court that would warrant transfer of investigation to any other agency. Therefore, prayer of the counsel for the petitioner in this regard merits to be rejected,” the court said while rejecting plea for the CBI probe.
“The Economic Offences Wing of Crime Branch, Kashmir, shall undertake further investigation of the case with regard to the role of the complainants/plaintiffs /lawyers who had filed false complaints/cases before various courts and on the basis of the material that may be collected during investigation,” the court said, adding, “Appropriate action be taken against those found to be actively involved with the main accused, namely, Ajay Agarwal and Pankaj Jain.”
The court also ordered that Investigation as regards offence under Section 209 of RPC (dishonestly making false claim in Court) be taken to its logical conclusion.
“if found established, the material collected during investigation be placed before the respective courts for taking further action in the matter in accordance with law,” the court added.
The petition was filed by one Vikram Bhardwaj, a New Delhi based businessman, seeking court’s direction to constitute a Special Investigation Team to be headed by a police officer not below the rank of Dy. Inspector General of Police to carry on and monitor the investigation of the case (FIR No.69/2019). In the alternative, he had sought directions for handing over the investigation of the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) New Delhi in view of the seriousness of the offence and the expertise available with them for conducting such investigations.
According to the series of status reports filed by police pursuant to the directions passed by Court from time to time, the investigation in the case (FIR No.69/2019 of Police Station Anantnag) was initially conducted by Special Investigation Team headed by Dy.SP Headquarters Anantnag.
Police said that a challan has been produced against the two accused Ajay Kumar Agarwal (of Kolkata) and Pankaj Jain (of New Delhi) before the Court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Anantnag, on 14-09-2021.
In one of the status reports, the police said that petitioner (Vikram Bhardwaj) again approached the DIG, Anantnag, for re-investigation of the case and on the instructions of the DIG, a SIT headed by Dy.SP Headquarter, Anantnag, was constituted 13-02-2022 and further investigation of the case in terms of Section 173(8) of Cr.P.C was commenced. During further investigation of the case, the investigation was transferred to Crime Branch, Kashmir in terms of PHQ order dated 12-05-2022.
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