The Andhra Pradesh government on Wednesday assured the state high court that it will extend all the necessary cooperation to the Central Bureau of Investigation in conducting the probe in to the massive Satyam [Get Quote] fraud.

The assurance came after Justice VS Ramanna of Andhra Pradesh high court expressed strong displeasure over the attitude of the government towards the CBI. Admitting a petition filed by the CBI complaining lack of cooperation from the state government, the judge issued directions to the government to come up with its reply with in two-and-a-half hours.

Later in the afternoon, in its affidavit to the court, the state government said that it was immediately providing the Dilkusha Guest House of government to the CBI officials who had come to Hyderabad to probe the Rs 7,800 crore (Rs 78 billion) Satyam Computer scam.

The CBI, in a petition, had complained that it was not getting any cooperation or information from the government. CBI, which took over the investigations on Saturday last on the request of the state government, has constituted a 23-member team, consisting of experts from the different fields, including finances and accounting.

The three-member legal team of CBI includes M V Ramana, T V Ramana and B Ravindranath.

The agency, which took the probe in to its hands almost 45 days after the scam came to light, had pointed out that the CBI's office in Hyderabad did not have much space to accommodate a 23-member special team of the agency which will probe the case.

Moreover agency officials also felt that the place was not secure enough to keep truckloads of Satyam documents seized by the Crime Branch-CID of AP Police till now. In the absence of enough space, CBI officials were working out of one of the Satyam offices in Somajiguda area of Hyderabad.

The 6th Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate D Ramakrishna had already transferred all the cases related to the Satyam scam to the designated CBI court, the 14^th Additional Chief Metropolitan Court, which will now deal with these cases.