Former Kolkata police commissioner Rajeev Kumar, who had been served a notice yesterday to appear before the CBI at its CGO Complex office at Salt Lake by 10 am today, didn’t turn up and was learnt to have, instead, sought through an e-mail a month’s time. As CBI sleuths tried throughout the day to get an inkling of his whereabouts, Kumar reportedly consulted his lawyers before sending an e-mail to the CBI informing the central investigating agency that he needed time to appear before it, owing to his illness.

The CBI team was active throughout the day after Kumar failed to appear at the time specified. The agency was learnt to have alerted the immigration department of the city airport to foil any attempt by Kumar to take a flight out of Kolkata. Calcutta High Court had yesterday withdrawn the interim shield granted to him against arrest in the case and allowed the CBI to take whatever steps, including arresting him, it deemed fit for the investigation. However, a source close to the CBI said that the agency won’t give the former city police chief any further rope and is learnt to be consulting its lawyers to chalk out its next course of action to bring Kumar into its custody for interrogation in connection with the multi-crore chit fund scam.

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Earlier, a team of CBI sleuths comprising the investigation officer (IO) in the Saradha case Tathagata Bardhan, SP Partha Mukherjee and another officer set out in a car from the CGO complex around 3 p.m. fuelling speculation that they were off to the former commissioner’s residence at 34 Park Street. However, their vehicle reached the Nizam Palace compound, its city office, and after a brief discussion there they went to Ballygunge for consultation with the agency’s lawyer. The CGO complex was, throughout the day, a scene of intense activity with the CBI strengthening its team of sleuths who would interrogate the ADG CID. Sai Manohar, the special joint director of the CBI from Delhi, joined the team to give more teeth to the investigation.

A set of questions had been prepared to be put to Kumar should he join the probe, it was learnt. Meanwhile, the CBI officers are still clueless about the whereabouts of Kumar as they failed to establish any contact with him over the phone since his mobile was switched off since yesterday. A source close to the central agency said Kumar had evaded direct reply on many important issues related to the missing red diary, pen drive and other crucial documents in connection with the Saradha scam probe during his five-day marathon interrogation at Shillong beginning 9 February. Calcutta High Court yesterday vacated its interim order granting Kumar protection from arrest in the Saradha chit fund scam case.

Justice Madhumati Mitra also rejected Kumar’s prayer for quashing of a CBI notice that sought his appearance for questioning in the case. Justice Mitra pointed out that Kumar’s allegation that he was singled out for questioning by the CBI couldn’t be accepted, since other officers superior to him in the SIT had been questioned.