Digambar has photocopy of missing JICA file: Police
GOANEWS DESK, PANAJI | 11 August 2015 22:35 IST
Goa police claim that former chief minister Digambar Kamat possesses a photo copy of the file related to JICA project, while the original file is missing from the JICA office.
The crime branch of Goa police today evening raided Varca office of former PWD minister Churchill Alemao, amidst tight police bandobast, in search of the missing file.
The file was also not found in the office of JICA project or the residence of A M Wachasundar, the suspended project director.
Alemao is presently serving the police custody while Wachasundar has been remanded to judicial custody.
While opposing the anticipatory bail application of Kamat, the police have even claimed that Kamat showed the photocopy of the file to media person, not mentioning who the media person is.
The investigating authorities have charged that both the ‘main criminal conspirators’- Kamat and Alemao – have either concealed, destroyed or hidden the file.
The prime reason for taking Alemao into police custody was to search for the missing file.
The police are also expected to cite the same reason while demanding Kamat’s custody, when his anticipatory bail application will come up for the hearing tomorrow.
Pending hearing, Kamat is presently out with interim relief granted till order is issued on his bail plea.
Both Kamat and Alemao are charged with taking huge amount of bribes to grant consultancy contract to Louis Berger International Inc., the US-based firm, between 2009 and 2011.
Louis Berger is executing Goa’s water supply and sewerage project, funded by Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
The bribery issue came to light when Louis Berger officials admitted before the Department of Justice in New Jersey of having paid a bribe of around Rs six crore to ‘a’ minister and government officials in Goa.
Besides Alemao and Wachasundar, the police have already arrested Satyakam Mohanty, Louis Berger’s former vice president of India and Raichand Soni, the hawala operator, who transferred the bribe money from US to Goa.
this case has to come to its logical end!