A special court in Mumbai on Wednesday rejected the Central Bureau of Investigation's demand for further custody of Sarobjit Singh, son of NCSC Chairman Buta Singh, and three others in a bribery case and remanded them in judicial custody till August 12.
The court also posted their bail petitions for hearing on Thursday.
"I am rejecting CBI's demand for custody of all accused as sufficient time has been given for probe to the investigating agency. I also feel that further custodial interrogation is not necessary," judge S P Hayatnagarkar observed.
Besides Sarobjit, the other accused arrested in the case are Anup Begi, Dukhsingh Chouhan and Madan Solanki. They are facing charges of seeking a bribe of Rs one crore from Nashik-based contractor Rama Rao Patil to close a case pending before the National Commission for Scheduled Castes against him.
Patil had allegedly taken Rs 10 crore loan from a bank in the names of 100 conservancy workers without their consent and failed to pay the sum.
CBI said accused Sarobjit Singh alias Sweety was not cooperating with the probe and that he had denied his role in the crime.
CBI further said it wanted to take Sarobjit to Delhi for further investigations to ascertain the chain of events and modus operandi of the crime.
The investigating agency said Sarobjit was not revealing the name of the owner of mobile number from which several calls were made to hawala operators in Mumbai and Bangalore.
Sarobjit is trying to mislead the investigations, CBI alleged.
CBI informed the court that three more accused -- Shamlal Choudhary, an alleged hawala operator from Bangalore, Ishwar Singh and Chandan Singh -- are wanted in the case.
Ishwar and Chandan are servants of arrested accused Madan Solanki and Dukhsingh Chouhan, alleged hawala operators from Mumbai.
The CBI said that both Ishwar and Chandan are suspected to be carriers of money in pursuant to the conspiracy hatched in Delhi.
Sarobjit's lawyer Satish Maneshinde, said the accused has a right to silence and Sarobjit does not want to answer any questions put forth by CBI.
Maneshinde alleged that CBI had threatened to falsely implicate Sarobjit's father Buta Singh in the case if he (Sarobjit) did not confess.
He said a letter had been sent by Buta Singh to Nasik Police Commissioner alleging that the complainant, Ramrao Patil, was trying to vitiate the case registered against him in Nasik and also trying to influence it (the case) by offering gratitude to Buta's family members.
Maneshinde also requested the court to find out whether the Nasik Police Commissioner had acted on the letter sent by Buta Singh.
Meanwhile, all the four accused, including Sarobjit, applied for bail and the court asked prosecution to file a reply by Thursday.
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