The accused was arrested in Rishikesh
Mumbai: CBI arrested an IRS officer and additional commissioner of Central Goods and Services Tax (CGST), Vinay Kumar Kantheti, from Rishikesh on Monday in connection with a Rs 40 lakh bribery case. On Aug 27, CBI arrested Kantheti from his office at Raigad along with Sinha after arresting Rajput, who had accepted the Rs 40 lakh bribe from a businessman on behalf of the two officials. Subsequently, CBI challenged the CBI court order in Bombay High Court, which, on Sept 16, quashed and set aside the CBI court order and remanded the accused persons to two days’ CBI custody.
Kantheti had been absconding after Bombay High Court set aside a Thane special court order last week that had declared his arrest, along with that of two others, last month illegal and released him on bail. However, CBI court rejected the request for custody, held the arrests illegal and released the accused on bail.
CBI sources said that after the Bombay High Court order, CBI had arrested CGST superintendent Rakesh Kumar Sinha from his office in Raigad and private person Narinder Rajput, but Kantheti remained untraceable. It is stated that after the HC order, Kantheti went to Delhi by flight and from there he took a bus to travel to Rishikesh, where he was staying in a homestay in a remote area and adopted all precautionary measures to conceal his whereabouts. His phone was switched off and he was communicating only via a messaging app with his contact to avoid being traced, but CBI managed to trace him with the help of technical investigation. The next day, CBI produced the three accused before CBI court in Thane and sought their five days’ custody for interrogation. The same day, CBI took Sinha and Rajput into custody, but Kantheti remained at large. Kantheti had moved to the Supreme Court against the High Court order but his plea was dismissed.