Chennai: Nearly two months after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) conducted a raid in the food safety department office in Chennai, sleuths from New Delhi had flown down to the city and commenced interrogating the suspects of gutka scam in which top-level IPS officerss and a state minister were charged, on Wednesday.
According to an agency source, a special team had interrogated the owner of the MDM brand of gutka — Madhava Rao — and others at an undisclosed location in the city. “The agency can summon the suspects to New Delhi if needed,” the source added.
The source said that the CBI had thrown questions at the gutka manufacturer and others apart from video-recording the procedure. The scam that shook the state had come to light when the income tax officials raided the warehouse of the gutka manufacturer in Red Hills and confiscated a diary in 2016. The allegations were levelled against state health minister C. Vijayabaskar, DGP T.K. Rajendiran, former Chennai police commissioner S. George and others after the names were reportedly listed in the diary, which had allegedly elaborated the magnitude of bribe given to the suspects to turn a blind eye on the sales of banned gutkha products. The allegation is that the suspects had received nearly Rs 40 crore.
CBI had registered a case in May following the order of Madras high court, which was later upheld by the apex court. Deviating from its usual practice of adopting the first information report of the state, the CBI had registered a fresh case against some “unknown officials” of central excise department and state government.
Following the revelation of the scam, the DVAC registered a case in September 2017 but could not file the charge sheet before the stipulated period of six months. DMK MLA J. Anbazhagan approached a Madras high court soliciting CBI probe into the case, to which the court had heeded.
