Police custody till Jan 22 for Rajus, Srinivas

HYDERABAD: Satyam's tainted founder B Ramalinga Raju, his brother Rama Raju and the company's former CFO Vadlamani Srinivas will be shifted to police custody from judicial custody for four days from Sunday.

The 6th additional chief metropolitan magistrate granted their custody to the state CID, although the prosecution sought seven days' detention.

Correspondingly, their bail petition, which was to have been moved on January 19, will now come up on January 22.

The magistrate allowed the investigating agency to interrogate the accused in the presence of their counsel from 0700 hrs till 1700 hrs during their custody period and produce them before the court on January 22 at 1000 hrs.

"There is no requirement for police custody as we feel that our grounds were not taken into proper consideration before passing this order," he said, adding that "we are seeking to file a revision petition before the Andhra high court on Monday," defence counsel Bharat Kumar told reporters.

The revision petition would be filed in the appropriate court after studying the court's order on police custody, Kumar added.

Bharat Kumar further argued that "the (court) order was without proper grounds and contrary to law".

The magistrate also directed the police not to resort to third-degree methods during their custodial interrogation, Bharat Kumar said.

The Raju brothers were arrested on January 9 and have been in judicial custody since Saturday last. Srinivas was arrested on January 10 and sent to judicial remand, and all of them were lodged in the Chanchalguda central prison.