CBI seeks army help to investigate MI officer
Source: Subir Bhaumik / TIWN exclusive

September 18 2014: The CBI has formally sought the army's help to investigate an officer of Military Intelligence (MI) who has been named by Saradha chief Sudipta Sen in his tell-all letter to CBI.

Sen has named him as Colonel 'Surkumar" but apparently he was referring to Lt Col G Srikumar.

This officer is recepient of Sena Medal and Tripura chief moinister Medal for his role in counter-insurgency operations..

CBI officials say Sen has confirmed Srikumar's identity during interrogations.

After getting details that Assam police DGP Shankar Barua was paid a fat amount for providing police escort to Saradha 'cash convoys' in Assam, and perhaps more money being paid to another former DGP for security related services, CBI sleuths raided Barua's house.

Barua apparently used his command position to order district SPs provide security for Sen's cash convoys in Assam, Barua could not take the humiliation and committed suicide.

CBI has information after Sardha was paying money for security escorts for cash convoys ( vehicles carrying huge loads of cash from Assam to Bengal and elsewhere in Northeast) -- but it is possible MI officials might have taken money to provide similar services as well .

"They have the advantage of moving around in civilian clothing," said a CBI official." We are checking whether the MI officers provided such services to Saradha" .

A huge national security issue has developed around Saradha's cash finding its way to Jamaat e Islami through Trinamul MP Ahmed Hassan Imran , a former SIMI activist.

Bangladesh foreign minister A H Mahmood Ali on Thursday said before leaving Dhaka for Delhi on a visit that he will seek India's 'reassurance' that its territory will not be used against Bangladesh.

He referred to the Saradha cash for Jamaat as an issue.

"How can MI officers work for the same group and that too when in service," CBI officials asked.

CBI says Lt Col Srikumar had threatened to sue Sen's 'Seven Sisters Post' for a report on his unit's involvement in a robbery in Jorhat, for which Assam police sued Srikumar's unit.

He withdrew the case after he was paid a big amount by Sen through former CNN-IBN journalist Suman Chakrabarti.

The SSP put out a formal notice in the paper apologising to Srikumar for the report and blaming it on the former SSP editor Subir Bhaumik who had resigned by then following huge differences with Sudipta Sen.

Sen was apparently pressurising Bhaumik to 'patch up' with a powerful Assam minister now named in the Saradha scam after having carried a long investigation on a NRHM scam in the paper.

The report was written by SSP ace reporter Amarjyoti Bora who was also threatened regularly.

But after Bhaumik resigned and left, Sen got his new team led by Rajeev Bhattacharyya to patch up with Srikumar.

But army chief Gen V K Singh , now BJP's DONER minister, had slapped a promotion and vigilance ban on Lt Gen Dalbir Singh commanding 3rd Corps because Srikumar was operating under him.

Later V K Singh's successor General Bikram Singh removed the ban on Dalbir and he is now army chief after Bikram Singh.

Srikumar is accused of murder by a Manipuri man who says his son was killed by Srikumar;'s unit behind the officers mess in Rangapahar.

Dalbir, also accused , has been let off by the High Court because of absence of evidence of direct involvement.

V K Singh had however taken a tough view on Srikumar's activities and said at that time that ' we are soldiers, not mercenary killers' .

He had allowed the Assam police to investigate the MI unit for the Jorhat robbery in the house of military contractor Pona Gogoi.

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