Date:04/08/2003 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2003/08/04/stories/2003080400701300.htm

National

CBI probes may cause trouble in U.P.

By Vinay Kumar

NEW DELHI AUG. 3. Two Uttar Pradesh-centric cases being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) seem to have the potential of causing political turmoil in the State. While one is the murder of young poetess, Madhumita Shukla, in the heart of Lucknow on May 9, the other concerns alleged violations of rules to construct the Taj Heritage Corridor in the proximity of the monument at Agra.

The Taj Heritage project had nearly unseated the Bahujan Samaj Party Chief Minister, Mayawati and worsened ties with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over the BSP demand for sacking the Union Tourism and Culture Minister, Jagmohan, which was rejected by the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee.

The Taj Heritage project inquiry, handed over to the CBI by the Supreme Court recently, is progressing "well'' and the agency is likely to submit its preliminary report to the apex court within the next 10 days, highly-placed CBI sources told The Hindu here today.

The CBI, after scrutinising files of the U.P. Government, has prepared a report showing how the multi-crore-rupee project was given on a platter without even floating a tender. The role of several senior bureaucrats of the State and the question of complicity of the Union Environment Ministry officials has also come under the CBI scanner, sources said.

The issue involving the Taj, a world heritage site, has already cast its shadow on the Lok Sabha proceedings with the Central Ministries as well as the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) asserting that they never gave their sanction to the project for which the State Government had already spent Rs. 17 crores.

In the continuing investigation of the Madhumita Shukla murder case, entrusted to the CBI by the State Government, the agency has interrogated the former BSP Minister, Amarmani Tripathi, twice and grilled his wife, Madhumani also.

Relations between Mr. Tripathi and Madhumita Shukla, came to the fore during the former Minister's questioning. Sources said that his wife has reportedly admitted to knowledge of her husband's ties with Madhumita.

Both of them were questioned separately by the CBI sleuths in the capital. There are chances that Mr. Tripathi could be interrogated further either in Lucknow or in Delhi. Sources believe that he was concealing more than he had revealed to the agency. Efforts are also on to simultaneously verify his version. The CBI is also in possession of some letters of Madhumita and other documents which disclose her relationship with Mr. Tripathi and the "strain'' that had come in it later.

Sources said the CBI was "coming close'' towards identifying the killers on the basis of several "important clues.'' Madhumita's servant, Deshraj, the only eye-witness to the murder in Lucknow appears to be "confused.'' Several leads were being followed by the CBI to get to the killers.