Delhi Police on Wednesday questioned the aide of the Karnataka Home Minister G Parameshwar in connection with the alleged attempt by AIADMK (Amma) leader TTV Dinakaran to bribe Election Commission officials.
Police sources said that VC Prakash on Wednesday accepted that he received a call from Mallikarjun, (who was arrested along with Dinakaran on April 25) to arrange cash from Bengaluru. “However, Prakash denied arranging the cash. Prakash was picked up from the Bengaluru airport.”
The statement of Prakash was recorded under Section 164 of the CrPc. On Tuesday, Crime Branch probing the case had issued a lookout notice for Prakash who was the Deputy Chairman of the NRI Forum in Karnataka.
It is suspected that Prakash had helped Mallikarjuna in the money transfer through hawala route, police said.
He has already been questioned once and is likely to be grilled again on Friday. “It was suspected that he might escape from here and that is why a lookout notice was issued. His statement has been recorded once and he will be questioned again this week,” said the officer. Dinakaran was arrested here on the night of April 25 after four days of questioning for allegedly attempting to bribe an unidentified EC official to get the undivided AIADMK’s ‘two leaves’ election symbol for his faction for a by-election to the RK Nagar Assembly seat in Tamil Nadu which was later cancelled by the Election Commission. The EC had frozen AIADMK’s ‘two leaves’ symbol after two factions led by Sasikala and former Chief Minister O Panneerselvam staked claim to it. Dinakaran has been accused of allegedly arranging the amount from undisclosed sources and getting it transferred from Chennai to Delhi through illegal channels. His name had surfaced after police arrested an alleged middleman Sukesh Chandrasekar who had allegedly told Dinakaran that he had contacts in the EC and would help his faction get the election symbol.