SCANDAL

Closing in on politicians

ANUPAMA KATAKAM
in Mumbai

After the arrest of an unprecedented number of police officers, the investigations in connection with the stamp paper scam are likely to focus on the involvement of politicians.

THE multi-crore stamp paper scam now hangs like the sword of Damocles over the heads of politicians in Maharashtra and possibly over the Democratic Front government too. The links between Abdul Karim Telgi, the prime accused, and some key politicians have been reportedly established by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the scam. Eleven senior police officers have been arrested so far and politicians cutting across parties know that the investigations will focus on them next. Informed sources hinted that a former Chief Minister and a few senior Ministers in the present government could be called in for questioning.

In what seemed to be the first signs of nervousness, Deputy Chief Minister and Home Minister Chhagan Bhujbal announced in the Assembly on December 9 that the State was all set to hand over the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). "It is obvious why he wants the CBI to take over. It gets the SIT's investigation off his back. The SIT has made it clear that it will not spare anyone," says Julio Ribeiro, former Mumbai Police Commissioner. "Clearly, they are beginning to feel the heat and the CBI coming in will stall the probe." It would take at least two months for the CBI to study the case.

Whether the SIT was close to proving a politician-police-Telgi nexus or not, informed sources indicated that some skeletons would soon tumble out. Ostensibly, Bhujbal's reason for bringing in the CBI is that the SIT may not be able to handle the investigation into the rapidly unfolding scam. Besides, he said, the Central government was putting pressure on Maharashtra that considering the national sweep of the scam it was best to bring in the CBI.

During the initial days of the scam there was a distinct possibility of the CBI taking over the investigations. But the Bombay High Court, which appointed the SIT, refused to hand it over to the Central agency. On November 27 the court ruled that a change of hands at this stage would hamper the investigations. The court acknowledged that the SIT, led by former Deputy Inspector-General of Police S.S Puri, was doing a thorough job of the investigations. Following the filing of six Public Interest Litigation (PIL) petitions against handing over the investigations to the CBI, the Judges announced that the issue would be heard on January 16. Until then the SIT will continue with the investigations.

The Telgi scam involved the printing and selling of thousands of crores worth of counterfeit stamp paper across seven States through a network reportedly initiated in 1995 by Abdul Karim Telgi, a resident of Belgaum. The centres of the operation were Maharashtra, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Telgi apparently colluded with officials of the India Security Press (ISP) in Nashik to purchase second-hand equipment from the press and print fake stamp paper. The paper was sold through licensed agents at attractive discounts; the licences were obtained through Anil Gote, a former Member of the Legislative Assembly, who is now in jail. Telgi ran his racket for a year before he was busted, but in that time he had built a thriving business through agents, with the complicity of police officials.

THE SIT investigations have led to the arrest of an unprecedented number of police officers in the State. They have been questioned on allegations of receiving money, aiding Telgi or turning a blind eye to his activities. The SIT has made it clear that anyone even remotely connected with Telgi will be investigated. Most shocking was the arrest on December 1 of former Mumbai Police Commissioner R.S. Sharma under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA). The arrest came a day after he retired and was preceded by five marathon sessions of questioning on his alleged complicity in shielding Telgi.

Sharma was appointed Police Commissioner last year after the court cleared him of involvement in the scam. But when investigations, initiated on the basis of a PIL petition filed by anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare this year, began to unravel the scam, Sharma came under the scanner again. On November 12, the SIT submitted an interim report to the Bombay High Court indicting Sharma for lapses in probing the scam when he was the Police Commissioner in Pune and Mumbai. It is said to have listed nine instances of acts of omission and commission by him.

One of the instances cited is that Sharma was aware that Telgi was in Mumbai but failed to do anything about it. In another instance, the report states that he did not look into a complaint about the omission of names in a charge-sheet written by an officer investigating the racket in Pune. The officer has alleged that Sharma asked him to stay clear of the issue. A SIT source told Frontline: "There is enough to prove his culpability. He has to go." Opposition members have demanded Bhujbal's resignation ever since the scam broke. The demand got shriller after the arrest of Sharma, who is said to have been Bhujbal's choice for the Commissioner's post.

The most incriminating evidence with the SIT is 1,300 hours of taped telephone conversations Telgi allegedly had with police officials and politicians, which it received from the Karnataka Police. An informed source told Frontline that as the tapes got transcribed, more evidence and more names were bound to come out. "They possibly nailed Sharma on the basis of the tape recordings," the source said. Even before the tapes were handed over, the SIT had arrested Joint Commissioner of Police (Intelligence) Sridhar Vagal, the first top officer arrested under MCOCA. Vagal allegedly accepted Rs.72 lakhs from Telgi over a period of time and had amassed wealth and property amounting to Rs.50 crores.

Telgi's tentacles spread to all levels of the police force. Among the first to be arrested were: Assistant Commissioner of Police Gokul Bhagaji Patil of the State intelligence, Inspector Vashist Andhale from the Sahar airport crime branch unit and Sub-Inspector Prabhakar Kakade of the Nalasopara police station. Inspector Dattatreya Dhaal and Assistant Police Inspector Dilip Pandurang Kamath were arrested after the SIT found that they had received almost Rs.96 lakhs from the scamster. Kamath reportedly owned "disproportionate assets" totalling Rs.100 crores. In the latter part of November the SIT arrested Assistant Commissioner of Police R.B. Yenam for not investigating a case involving Telgi. But the biggest catch after Vagal and Sharma was Assistant Commissioner of Police M.C. Mulani, who was arrested under MCOCA on the charges of bribery and extortion. Apparently, Mulani took almost Rs.3 crores for dropping the names of Telgi's wife and daughter from a charge-sheet. Another big fish being questioned is retired Director-General of Police Subhash Malhotra.

Mumbai's once-enviable police force is in disarray. The number of police officers arrested in the scam has stunned the State. Ribeiro has held interference by politicians as the main reason for the deterioration. "Undoubtedly, the morale of the force is low... . We are proposing an overhaul of the system," he told Frontline. Ribeiro and a team of former police officials, along with former Mumbai Police Commissioner D.S. Soman, have told the Chief Minister to draw on some of the procedures followed by the Central government with regard to police officers. These include forming a high-level panel to decide on promotions.

"There is also a need for some drastic remedies," said Ribeiro. These include using Article 311(2)(b)(c), which says that an erring officer can be sacked without a departmental inquiry, and cutting the salary of a suspended officer. Furthermore, Ribeiro felt that officers must not be posted to Mumbai in the early part of their careers. He said: "We must understand that the common man bears the brunt of a poor police culture. Politicians should also realise that if they had a good police force, half their work was done."

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