Quiet patriotism will defeat muscular nationalism: PC

New Delhi: "Quiet patriotism will defeat muscular nationalism," veteran Congress leader P Chidambaram said, commenting on the results of the Assembly polls and by-elections as they were being finalised on Thursday evening. The ex-finance minister, who is currently in ED custody in the INX Media case, made these remarks just after a special CBI judge here extended his ED remand till October 30, for an additional six days.

After the Supreme Court strongly reprimanded the CBI for insisting he was trying to influence witnesses in the INX case without any material evidence to that regard, thereby granting him bail in the CBI case; Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta on Thursday sought for seven days of further custodial interrogation of Chidambaram.

Earlier on October 17, the court here had granted ED Chidambaram's custody for seven days.

Mehta argued that while the Congress leader was compliant and responded to the 65 questions put to him on the first day of interrogation, the pace of his response slowed considerably when he was put specific questions supported by "incriminating documentary material" in the following days.

The SG said that the ED had broadly categorised the evidence against Chidambaram in the money-laundering case into three categories, namely email exchanges between co-conspirators and family members; benami properties beneficially owned by family members of Chidambaram; and statements of witnesses, co-conspirators and people involved in the process of laundering the alleged proceeds of crime.

Calling the amount of evidence that Chidambaram needed to be confronted with "voluminous", SG Mehta sought for seven more days of custodial interrogation. However, Special judge Ajay Kumar Kuhar raised important questions on the ED's investigative process as the earlier remand order by this same court had granted ED custody based on the request that Chidambaram needed to be confronted with up to 12 witnesses in the case.

When asked how many witnesses he was confronted with in the last seven days, ED told the court that they had been recording Chidambaram's statement under section 50 of the PMLA for the last seven days and that he had not been confronted with any witnesses.

Judge Kuhar had then reprimanded the ED, saying, "You recorded statement for the last five days. You said you needed to confront him with witnesses so earlier remand was granted. Now you say he has not been confronted with witnesses yet. 50 days of remand will also be less like this. The Investigating Officer's pace of investigation cannot go on like this."

As a last resort, senior advocate Kapil Sibal, arguing for Chidambaram had also made an oral plea to the court that his client be provided interim relief as he was suffering from a serious gastroenteric illness that needed to be looked at by his doctors at the Asian Institute of Gastroenterology, after which he would be back in Delhi.

Interestingly, despite raising serious questions on ED's investigative pace, the court here remanded Chidambaram to ED custody for six more days, adding that if there were to develop any critical medical issue, he be immediately taken to AIIMS in the Capital, which the SG had earlier argued was the best medical facility in the country. The court here also ordered the issuance of production warrants for all the accused in the CBI's INX Media chargehseet, asking them to be produced before the judge on November 29.

Meanwhile, the Delhi High Court on Thursday also sought a response from the ED on the bail plea filed by Chidambaram in the INX Media money-laundering case, asking it to file a reply within a week and setting the next date of hearing for November 4.