In a move that came as a boost to the Crime Branch sleuths, Magistrate Mohammed Saleem — before whom Vindoo and two other accused were produced — also remanded hawala operator Alpesh Patel and fashion designer Prem Taneja in police custody till May 28.
Friday’s development should be seen in the light of the fact that the same magistrate’s court had refused to grant police custody to six bookies. Instead, the court had remanded them in judicial remand till June 5.
The six bookies who are currently in the judicial custody, are — Ramesh Vyas, Pandurang Kadam, Ashok Vyas, Neeraj Shah, Pravin Bera and Pankaj Shah alias lotus.
Making a strong case for the extension of the custody of Vindoo, Patel and Taneja, Public Prosecutor Wajid Shaikh informed the court that the police wanted them in their remand, as they had not completed their custodial interrogation. “Investigations are still in initial stages. The police want to interrogate the three further,” Shaikh said.
Shaikh said that Vindoo Singh had links with bookies across the country and hence his elaborate custodial interrogation was necessary. “Extension of Vindoo Singh’s police custody is very important for us, because it is he who has named Meiyappan. Therefore, when Meiyappan appears before us, we will be able to confront them and get more information,” a senior investigating officer said.
The investigations have revealed that Vindoo, who is being seen as both as a conduit between bookies and sections of film and cricketing fraternity and himself as an active bookie operating in the nickname of Jack, was in constant touch with CSK’s team principal and BCCI chief Srinivasan’s son-in-law Meiyappan.
On his part, Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Himanshu Roy, who is spear-heading the investigations into the IPl spot fixing scam, had gone on record saying that the prolonged interrogation of Vindoo and scanning of the Call Detail Record (CDR) had revealed “call-transactions” between the arrested actor and Meiyappan as well as with some bookies.
Roy’s statement should be viewed in the light of the leaks from the city crime branch officials probing the IPl spot-fixing scam that Vindoo has told his interrogators that Meiyappan had, through him, placed huge bets on IPl-6 matches and lost to the tune of Rs 1 crore. However, there is absolutely no official confirmation as to the veracity of either the leak or the claim purportedly by Meiyappan.