CBI finds letter ‘blackmailing’ Kalmadi
The CBI, which carried out searches at the residence of Commonwealth Games Organising Committee chairman Suresh Kalmadi on Friday, has reportedly recovered an alleged blackmail letter demanding `4 crore from him in exchange for a “compact disc” carrying some damaging information.
According to sources, the agency is verifying the authenticity as well as contents of the unsigned letter reportedly recovered from Mr Kalmadi’s residence in New Delhi. The letter will now be sent for forensic examination, sources said, adding that Mr Kalmadi could not provide a satisfactory reply about the letter. The sources, however, refused to disclose any reference made in the letter about the contents of the CD.
The CBI on Friday had conducted simultaneous raids at Mr Kalmadi’s home and offices in New Delhi, Mumbai and Pune as part of its ongoing investigations into the multi-crore CWG scam. The agency also recovered several documents and seized the harddisks of four computers from his office in New Delhi.
Sources in the CBI on Saturday maintained that the original documents related to five crucial deals of the CWG, required by the agency, are still missing from the office of the OC. According to sources, the missing original documents include the selection procedure followed for hiring Event Knowledge Service (EKS) as a technical consultant for the CWG by the OC; the appointment of insurance consultants in the field of risk management; the visit of OC members to Beijing before the CWG games, a contract related to catering services and the appointment of certain top officials (retired government officials) by OC members. The agency is likely to register a separate case against certain officials of the OC on charges of destruction of evidence, sources added.
“EKS, a company hired for `29 crores as a technical consultant for the Games by the OC, was allegedly given undue favours by OC members. An interim report of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India had already said the EKS deal was an example of undue favours,” the sources said. The Central probe agencies want to know who finally approved the hiring of EKS, sources said, adding the CBI may question Mr Kalmadi in this regard, if required.
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