Cash-for-vote scam: Suhail Hindustani, Sanjeev Saxena's judicial custody extended

NEW DELHI: A Delhi court today extended till August 18 the judicial custody of Suhail Hindustani and Sanjeev Saxena, arrested for their alleged role in the 2008 cash-for-vote scam.

Hindustani and Saxena were produced before Special Judge Sangita Dhingra Sehgal after expiry of their judicial custody.

"Both the accused are remanded to judicial custody till August 18," the court said after Crime Branch of the Delhi Police sought extension of their judicial remand saying their investigation in the case is yet to be completed.

Advocate Anand, appearing for Hindustani, submitted that the copy of the FIR of the case has not been provided to the defence counsel.

The Delhi Police, however, provided the FIR copy to the defence counsel after the court's direction.

Slammed by the Supreme Court for a shoddy probe into the cash-for-vote scam, Delhi Police had first arrested Saxena on July 17 and he was remanded in police custody for three days. Hindustani was arrested on July 20.

The duo have been booked for various offences under the Prevention of Corruption Act, the police said.

The case was registered in 2009 on recommendation by a Parliamentary panel which had probed the cash-for-vote scam dating back to July 2008.

On July 22, 2008, some BJP MPs had waved wads of currency notes on the floor of Lok Sabha during the trust vote faced by the UPA-I government, claiming they were given the money to vote in favour of the Manmohan Singh government.

Hindustani and Saxena were earlier sent to judicial custody by the court on July 22.

The duo had alleged that the probe against them was an "eyewash" as the police, which ruled out the role of Samajwadi Party, was questioning its former leader Amar Singh.

They had also termed the probe as "malicious" and had said the Delhi Police, which on July 21 had given clean chit to Congress Party and SP, was later on examining Singh who was associated with the latter.

During the last hearing, the court had asked the police about the outcome of the accused's custodial interrogation.

Hindustani's counsel had earlier alleged that police had flouted the court's order regarding presence of defence counsel at the time of the interrogation of the accused in their custody as he was not told about it at all.

Responding to the court's query, the police had said the accused were interrogated "at length" and the probe was going on in a fair manner.

The police had alleged that Hindustani was the "master orchestrator" of conspiracy to bribe BJP MPs to vote in favour of Manmohan Singh government in a trust vote in 2008.