Kumar is in the dock over allegations of receiving bribe from Hyderabad-based businessman Sathish Sana who has claimed he also bribed Rakesh Asthana

A Delhi Court, on Wednesday (October 31), granted tainted CBI DSP Devender Kumar, accused in a corruption case that also names the agency’s special director Rakesh Asthana as an accused, bail after counsel for the probe agency submitted that he was no longer required for custodial interrogation.

The bail, subject to Kumar depositing a surety of Rs 50000, was granted on a day when another senior CBI officer, SS Gurm, moved the Delhi High Court alleging that the new dispensation at the probe agency was trying to derail the investigations against Asthana and other accused in the corruption case related to Hyderabad-based businessman Sathish Babu Sana and meat exporter Moin Qureshi.

During the arguments on the bail petition, special CBI Judge Santosh Snehi Mann, was informed by Kumar’s lawyers that every rule had been violated by the probe agency in this case and the “irony” is that the person who followed the rule is in jail.

The CBI counsel, on his part told the court that all relevant information to be sought from Kumar during his police custody had been documented by the agency and that if bail were to be granted to the accused, strict conditions should be imposed.

In his bail application, Kumar had termed his custody “illegal” and urged the court to set him free. The application also said that Kumar was ready to abide by the conditions imposed by the court while granting him bail. It claimed that the CBI sleuths did not have valid search warrants when they raided his office and residence.

Kumar and Rakesh Asthana, the CBI special director who was divested of all responsibilities by the Centre last week and sent on leave following Sana’s testimony before a magistrate, have both challenged the legality of the FIR filed against them. Besides Kumar and Asthana, two alleged middlemen — Manoj Prasad and Somesh Prasad — have also been named as accused in the case.

Kumar has claimed that he was falsely implicated in the case and that he was a victim of rivalry among the senior officers of the central probe agency. He had said he was investigating a case against meat exporter Moin Qureshi, in which the complainant in the present case — Sathish Babu Sana — was a suspect and the names of some past and present senior CBI officers had surfaced. He added that his arrest in the present case was motivated to stall the investigation against Moin Qureshi and that there was no direct allegation against him.

— India Legal Bureau