By IANS,
New Delhi : A Delhi court Friday sent Sanjeev Saxena, a former private secretary to Amar Singh, and Suhail Hindustani, a former member of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) youth wing, to 14 days of judicial custody, for their alleged involvement in the 2008 cash-for-votes scam.
“Both the accused are remanded to 14 days in judicial custody, till Aug 5,” said Special Judge Sangeeta Dhingra.
The court sent Saxena and Hindustani to the Tihar Jail after Delhi Police’s Crime Branch said they don’t want their custody for further interrogation in the case.
As the court asked about the interrogation done during the last 24 hours, the Crime Branch said that Hindustani, whom they claim to be the key conspirator in the scam, was made to confront Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer S.P Gupta, a witness in the case.
The prosecution also submitted that the two were personally interrogated by the joint commissioner of the Crime Branch.
Defence counsel, however, accused police of not complying with the court’s order, saying that they were not allowed to remain present during the custodial interrogation of their clients despite the court’s order for this Thursday.
Slammed by the Supreme Court for a shoddy probe into the cash-for-vote scam, Delhi Police first arrested Saxena July 17 and he was remanded in police custody for three days.
Hindustani was arrested July 20.
The duo had been booked for various offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, the police said.
The case was registered in 2009 on the recommendation of a parliamentary panel which had probed the cash-for-vote scam dating back to July 2008.
On July 22, 2008, three BJP MPs waved wads of currency notes on the floor of the Lok Sabha ahead of the trust vote the UPA-I government was taking. They claimed they were given the money to vote in favour of the Manmohan Singh government.
The vote was called after the Left parties withdrew support over the Indo-US nuclear agreement.