Top Court rejects CBI plea against Rajeev Kumar’s anticipatory bail

Kolkata: The Supreme Court on Friday dismissed a Special Leave Petition (SLP) filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) challenging the Calcutta High Court’s order that had granted anticipatory bail to West Bengal Director General of Police and former Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar in connection with the multi-crore Saradha chit fund scam.

A Bench of Chief Justice of India B.R. Gavai and Justice K Vinod Chandran upheld the High Court’s decision, observing that there was no reason to interfere with the order. The court also directed that the pending contempt of court case—related to allegations that the state police obstructed the CBI’s probe into the Saradha scam—be listed after eight weeks for hearing.

In November 2019, the apex court had asked Kumar to respond to the CBI’s challenge to his anticipatory bail, but the matter remained pending since then. Earlier, the Calcutta High Court had found no justification for his custodial interrogation, noting that such detention was “not justified” in the given circumstances.

A Division Bench of Justices Sahidullah Munshi and Subhasis Dasgupta had observed that Kumar, who as Commissioner of Bidhannagar Police headed the Special Investigation Team (SIT) before the probe was transferred to the CBI, had already appeared before the agency for questioning on several occasions.

Rejecting the CBI’s contention of discrepancies in seizure timings and possible tampering of call data records, the High Court said such issues could be appropriately examined at trial. It noted that Kumar had “consciously offered himself to be interrogated” and that there was no “clinching material” to justify custodial interrogation.

The case dates back to the 2019 standoff when Kolkata Police detained CBI officers who arrived to question Kumar, prompting Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to stage a sit-in protest in his defence.

Senior advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Biswajit Deb, assisted by advocates Anando Mukherjee and Shwetank Singh, represented Kumar before the Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, TMC MP and advocate Kalyan Banerjee accused the Centre of trying to politicise the issue and told the media that the court was able to detect such a motive of the Centre.