A special CBI court on Tuesday extended the custody of Congress leader P. Chidambaram’s son Karti Chidambaram by three days in the INX Media money laundering case.

Earlier, the Central Bureau of Investigation had underlined that it had “concrete credible evidence collected recently” against him after which the custody was extended. The CBI had told the court that it wanted to question Karti for nine more days.

Advertisement

The next hearing for Chidambram’s bail plea will now take place on March 9.

Earlier in the day, Karti’s lawyer told the court that he “is not a terrorist”, therefore he can be questioned without taking him in custody.

One of the lawyers for the agency told the court that it had “prima facie material” pointing to Karti Chidambaram’s wrongdoing and that “there is a need for his custodial interrogation” as his previous custody was only for four days.

Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who is arguing the case for the CBI, alleged that Karti Chidambaram had been tampering with evidences in the case and “if the court extends the custody, then I will get a confession” from him.

He said Karti Chidambaram had refused to share his phone password with his interrogators which “is also a proof” that he was not cooperating.

Singhvi told the court that the accused had already spent five days in the agency’s custody and was confronted with Indrani Mukerjea, a former media executive jailed in a murder case and a witness in the money laundering case, in Mumbai for only 25 minutes.

He contended that the agency had not submitted a single reason why it wants extension of the remand.

(With agency inputs)