Former union telecom minister Dayanidhi Maran addressing a press conference in Chennai on Thursday. Photo. M. Moorthy
"The CBI is torturing and forcing the arrested persons to give statements against me," the former union telecom minister alleged.
Former Union Minister Dayanidhi Maran alleged that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) was "forcing his associates to give a statement against him" in the the BSNL case.
The case pertains to allegations that a virtual telephone exchange was reportedly set-up at the house of Mr. Maran to enable data transfer benefitting Sun TV group owned by his brother Kalanidhi Maran. The CBI had registered a case against Mr. Dayanidhi Maran and some BSNL officials for allotting over 300 high-speed telephone lines for the purpose.
Mr. Maran further said, an "intellectual" from Tamil Nadu wants to fix the DMK by "misusing his power." He, however, refused to name the individual.
“CBI should be fact finding bureau not a fixing bureau”
"The CBI have threatened my associates that they will be let go if they give a statement against me," Mr. Maran said, a dayf after the top investigation agency arrested three persons, including Mr. Maran's former secretary, in the telephone exchange case.
"I have written a letter to the CBI Director on the arrest of his associates," he said.
Accusing the CBI of acting like a state government missionary, Mr. Maran said: "CBI should be fact finding bureau not a fixing bureau."
The three people arrested by CBI on wednesday night were given "3rd degree treatment," he said.Earlier, Mr. Maran met the DMK president M Karunanidhi.
Asserting that he would fight out the case, Mr Maran hit out at CBI, saying “Is CBI trying to impress the RSS ideologue from Tamil Nadu? The telephone line still functions in my residence....CBI wants to pass the buck, I have no choice but to fight it out.”
“CBI has filed FIR against me alleging that when I was the telecom minister there was excess use of telephone connection. I have explained. This investigation has been going on for eight years”, he said. He said for the last 18 months the arrested people have been called by CBI and they cooperated in all the investigation procedures.
The arrested persons included Chief Technical Officer S Kannan and electrician L S Ravi of Sun TV network.
“They were also promised if they give such a statement against me, they will be allowed to go,” Mr. Maran claimed.
“The case was foisted against me during the UPA regime.The intellectual from Tamil Nadu fixed it, it was done by him,” he said.
“There is only one telephone connection.... I will be writing to the CBI on this matter”, he said
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