The CBI is believed to have sought permission from its head office in Delhi to arrest IPS officer Geetha Johri and former top cop OP Mathur if they do not co-operate in the Sohrab case probe. Sources said the probe agency had sought the permission in the first week of July when it submitted its investigation report to the CBI director in New Delhi.
The sources said the CBI had also sought permission to arrest retired police officer GC Raigar if he did not cooperate. However, as he seems to have given the agency some vital information when summoned in the case, the chances of his being arrested have receded, the sources said. The CBI has again summoned Mathur and Johri. Mathur has sought more time on the ground that his mother is ill while Johri, who is currently in London, has been asked to appear before the agency by August 10, 2010.
The CBI team probing the case had also sought the headquarters advice in the first week of July on the arrest of former Gujarat minister of state for home Amit Shah, and the former DGP PC Pandey. The probe team got the go-ahead to arrest Shah but orders on Pandey are still awaited.
When police inspector VL Solanki was investigating the Sohrab case, Johri was supervising it and Raigar was ADGP, CID (crime).
The sources said that when it was learnt that Solanki was close to the truth in the case, Shah told Raigar to stop the investigation.
The probe was later handed over to IPS officer Rajneesh Rai who was then DIG, CID (crime). Raigar was replaced by Mathur who allegedly tried to subvert the investigation on the instruction of his political bosses.
The CBI wants to know the exact details of the political interference in the case that was carried out through these police officers. However, it is not known whether the probe agency’s legal department in New Delhi has given the green signal to arrest these officers if they do not cooperate with the investigation.“If Johri and Mathur co-operate with the investigation, they are unlikely to be arrested,” a source said.
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