By IANS,
Mumbai : A Mumbai court Wednesday sent Sarabjot alias Sweety Singh — the son of former home minister Buta Singh — and his three associates to judicial custody till Aug 12 in connection with a Rs.10 million corruption case.
Sessions Judge S.P.H. Nagarkar ordered their judicial custody while declining extension of police custody.
“The court said since the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has almost completed its investigations in the case, there was no need for granting police custody,” CBI Senior Public Prosecutor Ejaz Khan told IANS.
The CBI, which arrested the accused July 31, had secured their police custody till Wednesday.
The accused will now be lodged in Arthur Road Jail in south Mumbai, which also houses Pakistani terrorist Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab and rape-accused Bollywood actor Shiney Ahuja.
Sweety Singh’s lawyer S. Maneshinde announced shortly after the ruling that he would file a bail application for his client Thursday.
Sweety Singh had been caught taking a bribe of Rs.10 million from a Nashik-based contractor in return for facilitating the withdrawal of a case under the Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes act. His father Buta Singh is chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes.
Sweety Singh was caught by CBI sleuths in New Delhi.
The CBI also nabbed three of his accomplices — Anoop Bedi, Madan Solanki and Dukhsing Chauhan — from Mumbai, New Delhi and Pune.