Fake CBI officers assured help to accused in Sohrabuddin case

Two fake CBI officers, arrested recently in Mumbai, had approached some policemen accused in the fake encounter case of Sohrabbuddin Sheikh case and promised them help in diluting charges against them.

The two conmen -- Ashwini Kumar Sharma and Rajesh Ranjan -- who have been arrested by the CBI earlier for their alleged role in duping people, had approached an accused IPS officer and promised him help in diluting the case against him and others in return for payment of a few lakh rupees, sources privy to the probe said today.

The sources said Sharma and Rajan, who were posing as CBI officers, had approached the accused people through a Gujarat-based businessman, who is at present on the run and has not turned himself to the CBI despite several summons served to him.

The case became murkier when one of the accused turned out to be a relative of the Superintendent of Police of CBI who was probing the Sohrabbuddin case prompting the higher ups in the agency to transfer the officer immediately and also instituting an in-house enquiry to probe the allegations.

According to the sources, the allegations against the CBI officer who was shifted to Delhi had not been found true in so far any complicity on the part of the officer was concerned.

The CBI stumbled upon the role of the conmen recently when one of them was again arrested by the Mumbai police for allegedly duping a businessman.

The information was passed on to the CBI which was relevant to their investigations into the Sohrabuddin case.

Sharma and Ranjan, who were arrested in August last year, have allegedly cheated over 200 persons including film personalities and businessmen. According to the agency, the accused have been cheating people since 2006 by posing as CBI officers.

The duo's luck however ran out when they approached film producer Rakesh Roshan seeking money to settle a civil matter the filmmaker was embroiled in. Roshan allegedly paid a huge amount to the conmen and then approached the anti-corruption wing of CBI when his matter was not settled as assured.

Sharma would take his victims to government offices claiming to have contacts there and would ask them to sit outside. He had in fact once visited Tanna House, CBI's Mumbai headquarters.

According to CBI, Sharma had also approached R P Meena, commissioner of Income Tax, arrested in a graft case, and had sought money from him to settle the case registered against him.