Malik’s aide sent to CBI custody

PANCHKULA: A day after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is probing the case of loot and arson at Haryana finance minister Abhimanyu’s house during the February 2016 Jat stir, arrested Jat activist Pawan Hooda, a close aide of All India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti (AIJASS) president Yashpal Malik, from Rohtak, the accused was produced in a special CBI court in Panchkula on Wednesday.

The CBI had demanded sevenday police remand, but the defence counsel opposed the same and the court remanded Hooda to three-day CBI custody. Hooda’s name had appeared in the CBI chargesheet, which also indicted 50 others for vandalism at Abhimanyu’s house.

Defence counsel Satish Kadian said that Hooda was here from last two years and even got married last year. “How can the Haryana police and CBI mention him as a proclaimed offender? How will he know that his name is there, when no notice was given to him?” he said.

Pawan was among the 40 people booked by the state police in Abhimanyu’s house arson case. He was out on bail. As the state government handed the probe to the CBI, the premier agency added the names of 11 more people in its chargesheet. The 11 new names include another aide of Malik, Ashok Balhara, who is the general secretary of AIJASS.

However, he refuted this fact and said that he was neither among the 40 booked nor in the new names included. On Monday, around 20 youths booked in Abhimanyu’s case had gone live on Facebook, lauding the CBI for booking Balhara and reaching closer to Malik in its probe. The youths blamed Malik and Balhara of hatching the entire conspiracy and claimed the duo bought properties worth crores under the garb of agitation.