A magistrate court here is scheduled to consider on Monday the status of the Crime Branch (CB) investigation against IAS officer Sriram Venkitaraman.
The police had implicated the officer in a drunk driving accident that caused the death of journalist K.M. Basheer in August last.
The court is monitoring the investigation at the behest of Basheer’s newspaper, Siraj.
Accusation
The Siraj management had accused the police of having helped Mr. Venkitaraman erase incriminating evidence against him.
In a court filing, the newspaper alleged sub-inspector, Museum, Jayaprakash had “helped the bureaucrat dodge” the mandatory blood test to detect alcohol impairment, if any.
The officer also allegedly stacked the odds in favour of the accused by “failing” to video record the accident scene, identify the driver and record the statement of witnesses. Instead, the police hustled Mr. Venkitaraman away to the General Hospital (GH) and from there to a private a multi-specialty hospital, disobeying an order referring the accused to the Government Medical College Hospital here.
The police also allowed Mr. Venkitaraman’s co-passenger, Wafa Firoz, to leave the scene without verifying her identity or recording her statement.
Charge-sheet
The CB has reportedly charge-sheeted the case. However, the details are yet to emerge in the public domain.
It is unclear whether the agency has indicted Mr. Jayaprakash for destruction of evidence, a demand raised in the court by the Siraj management and journalists’ unions.
The CB had earlier indicted Mr. Venkitaraman for culpable homicide not amounting to murder, causing disappearance of evidence and dangerous driving.
The CB had also arraigned Ms. Wafa as an accused.
