Arnab moves HC seeking stay in suicide case probe, wants case given to CBI

Arnab has alleged that Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh is “prejudging and publicly guiding” the investigation in the 2018 suicide case of Anvay Naik.
Arnab Goswami
Arnab Goswami
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Republic TV Editor-in-Chief Arnab Goswami has filed an interim application in the Bombay High Court seeking a stay on the investigation into the 2018 suicide case of interior designer Anvay Naik, in which he has been named as an accused. He has also moved the court against his November 4 arrest by the Raigad police and has asked the High Court to transfer the investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). 

In his application, Arnab has alleged that he is being targeted by the Maharashtra government and mentioned a statement made by Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh where the latter had said that a ‘strong chargesheet’ will be filed 'soon' in the 2018 suicide case against Arnab. Arnab has said the Maharashtra minister is “prejudging and publicly guiding”  the investigation in the case and is also “putting a timeline of progression to the case.” 

“It is thus clear that the entire investigation in the case is being puppeteered by a political machinery and is tainted and prescripted by the executive powers…” Arnab said in his application. 

Arnab also contended that he was arrested with a “malafide intention in a completely illegal manner” and that there was no “basis of any law for conducting the said arrest.”

Arnab had been arrested on November 4 and was initially kept at a local school which is designated as a COVID-19 quarantine centre for the Alibaug prison. He was later shifted to the Taloja jail in Raigad district after allegedly being found using a mobile phone while in judicial custody. He remained in Taloja jail for a week till the Supreme Court granted him bail to Goswami on November 11. He was released from jail that night.

The Supreme Court bench of Justice DY Chandrachud and Indira Banerjee had said that it would be ''travesty of justice'' if personal liberty is curtailed. The top court had also granted interim bail to two others in the case — Neetish Sarda and Feroz Mohammad Shaikh — on a personal bond of Rs 50,000 each and directed that they shall not tamper with the evidence and shall cooperate in the probe.

Arnab had moved the Supreme Court a day after the Bombay High Court refused to grant interim bail to him and two others in the case and had asked them to move the local court for relief. 

The three accused were arrested by Alibaug police in Maharashtra's Raigad district on November 4 in connection with the suicide of architect-interior designer Anvay Naik and his mother in 2018 over alleged non-payment of dues by companies of the accused.

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