'DNA' exclusive: CBI to quizz Verma’s US business partner

A team of top CBI officials including the agency’s special director are leaving for the US to question attorney C Edmond Allen, the estranged partner of alleged arms-dealer Abhishek Verma.

Fearing legal action, Allen has refused to come to India to join the investigation.

The CBI team comprising special director VK Gupta, SP Ashwini Chand and investigating officer DSP Ram Singh, is leaving for New York in the first week of October after getting the clearance from the ministry of external affairs. The CBI has already sent a letter rogatory (LR) to the US authorities.

The federal agency claims that Allen’s statement is crucial for its probe against Verma as he has provided all the crucial information and relevant documents to the investigators. However, in the absence of any substantial evidence, the CBI has already failed to file its chargesheet against Verma in a case for allegedly taking $5.30 lakh from a Swiss firm Rheinmetall Air Defence AG, to use his influence to stall the blacklisting proceedings initiated by the government against it after the Ordnance Factory Board scam came to light. However, the agency has booked a couple of new cases against Verma.

It is reported that C Edmond Allen was a majority stakeholder in Ganton USA and Ganton India, alleged to be Verma’s front companies. Verma’s Romanian wife Anca Neascu was a director in Ganton India.

“Allen has provided all crucial information and documents and only on that basis were we able book Abhishek Verma and his wife. But, in order to make watertight cases in the court of law, we need to have Allen’s statement to substantiate documents. We have already failed to file a chargesheet in one of the cases in stipulated time frame and we do want to repeat it in our other cases against Verma,” a senior CBI officer told DNA.

Besides recording the statement, the CBI would try to convince Allen to depose before the Indian court.