Telgi's U-turn: Denies meeting or making payments to Pawar, Bhujbal

PUNE: The kingpin of the fake stamp paper scam Abdul Karim Telgi has termed reports on his narco-analysis test beamed by TV channels as "false and baseless" and denied having either met Union Minister Sharad Pawar and Maharashtra Minister Chhagan Bhujbal or paid any money to them.

"I am shocked and mentally disturbed after reading the news of the narco-analysis test which was done in Bangalore Forensic Science Laboratory in 2003 that attributes me taking the names of Sharad Pawar and Chhagan Bhujbal as having received money from me," Telgi said in a three-page letter written to his lawyers Harshad Nimbalkar and Milind Pawar.

Both Pawar and Bhujbal have denied the claims purportedly made by Telgi in the footage of the test aired by the TV channels on September 6.

Telgi, who swore by Allah, said in his letter, "This is absolutely false and baseless. I have never stated this in my narco test. This is nothing but a game plan of some political persons to involve them in the fake stamp case."

Addressing a press conference with Milind Pawar, Nimbalkar said, "Telgi is ready to undergo further scientific tests and even interrogation by any agency anywhere to clear this issue." The press conference was convened to give the prime accused's reaction to the telecast of the purported footage of the narco-analysis test by TV channels.

The duration of the narco-analysis test was 35 minutes and Telgi remembers all the questions that were put to him by the FSL scientists, the lawyers said. He was shown the footage of the test and heard audio-cassettes while in the custody of STAMPIT (the Karnataka Police team investigating the case in that state) for eight days.

Telgi said there were no references to Pawar and Bhujbal in the visual CDs and cassettes which he had seen and heard in custody. The "so-called narco-analysis test" footage broadcast on September six was an attempt to "fix innocent people" in the fake stamp scam, the lawyers said.

"The particular CD that was telecast was fabricated. The original one was with the STAMPIT and this should be shown to the public," Nimbalkar said.

Telgi said he saw a conspiracy behind the telecast of the narco-analysis test three years after it was done and wanted a probe conducted by the CBI to expose those who were behind the tampering of the footage, the lawyers said. Telgi also plans to write to the CBI about this, they said.

Meanwhile, Telgi was ready with his confessional statement in the Bund Garden case. It runs into 836 pages and contains the names of politicians, bureaucrats and businessmen. Telgi has instructed his lawyers to file an application in this connection with the special MCOCA court in Pune that is hearing the fake stamp case.

Telgi has already made a confessional statement in a fake stamp seizure case registered in Mumbai. He made the statement in February 2006 before the Chief Judicial Magistrate in Pune and it was later despatched to the special court in Mumbai in a sealed cover.

Telgi, now held at Yerwada jail in Pune, has communicated to Irfan, one of his relatives who visited him recently with the court's permission that he had not named any politician during the narco-analysis test conducted on him in 2003, his lawyer M T Nanaiah said in Bangalore.

He reiterated he was ready with his 614-page confessional statement and awaiting the Supreme Court's permission to make the statement before the jurisidictional magistrate in Bangalore in person, he said.

Nanaiah said he would visit Telgi in the next two weeks to decide the legal course to be adopted over the release of "fake" CDs by unknown persons.

Telgi has refused to make his confessional statement through video conferencing.