Setting foot on the CBI premises may be a path to infamy. Whether one is a genuine culprit or not, a very summon from the CBI for grilling has a damaging effect and can rip apart the reputation and public image of a person that he has to take long years and make strenuous efforts to build.
If anyone, the politicians are the most vulnerable in the ongoing exercise to attend the CBI summons over the chit fund scam in the State. For the politicians, their public image is all important. Here is based their career. Once the image gets tainted, no matter whether court finally acquits or convicts one, everything is gone.
BJD MlA Pravat Tripathy, MP Ramchandra Hansdah and former MlA Subrana Naik, who have been grilled and subsequently put behind the bars for their culpability in the multi-crore Ponzi scam, are the worst victims of threat to image. An ace politician that he is, Tripathy, among the three, had gone extra miles and did everything possible to save his public face but in vain. He kept denying of having any link with the controversial tape where he allegedly was heard to be approaching AT Group chief Pradeep Sethy for funds. He took the help of the High Court and sought anticipatory bail to avoid arrest. His supporters went on a rampage at the CBI office and created ruckus in court with a view to prove the public support the Banki MlA enjoys. But at the end of the day, all his efforts failed to save him and he ended up cooling his heels in jail. Hansdah and Naik too pleaded innocence but that did not work up to save them from the clutches of law.
What is important to find here is the ruling BJD disowned Tripathy, Hansadh and Naik the very moment they were arrested. The image conscious party boss did not spare a fraction of a second to dump the trio knowing it well that any association with them could spoil the prospect of the party. Even BJD MP Bhartuhari Mahtab, who came out to defend the Banki MlA for a time and decried his suspension from the party, retracted and backed the party’s stand fearing threat to his image and the party. BJP acted on expected line and said former MlA Hitesh Bagartti who was arrested in the chit fund scam, had no link with the party years back.
Top politicians, former BJD leader and OJM chief Pyarimohan Mohapatra and Cuttack-Choudwar MlA Pravat Biswal and his wife, have also gone to the CBI office for interrogation. Their controversial land deal with the Seashore Group put the Biswal duo in great embarrassment. For sometime Biswal maintained his cool but not beyond when he was pestered over persistent media quizzing on his cash- in- cheque-cash-in-hand transactions with the Seashore chief Prashant Dash. Biswal was found bursting before the media that he was no way linked with chit fund scam and that his deal was transparent-- all that to keep his image intact.
Apart from politicians, the CBI has also grilled a former AG, journalists, media house owners, brokers, businessmen, a sport administrator, a model, a BJD office secretary and the latest, two senior IPS officers. Of these, a few have been arrested, while a few are being summoned up off and on. The TV footages of the very appearance of these people before the CBI, their being taken to court in police custody and constant hobnobbing in the CBI office have, there is little doubt, created a wrong perception among the public. Probably, this is the reason why summon from the probe agency is sending jitters among the known public figures.
The recent seizure of Seashore broker Subhankar Nayak’s diary has, therefore, robbed may people of their sleep as it could open up a Pandora’s Box and lead to parading of many worthy figures who would be dusting their feet in the CBI precincts.