Government asked to bring in CBI for thorough investigation
Dimapur, September 18 : Piqued by ‘unprofessional’ and ‘incompetent’ manner of handling the fuel adulteration case, a public meeting of 12 civil organisations held here at Hotel Lake Shilloi on September 10 unanimously decided that all the guilty parties in the racket be punished as per the FIR filed by the ACAUT.
The meeting resolved to set up a Coordinating Committee on Fuel Adulteration comprising two representatives each from Naga Council Dimapur, NTC, NWHD, CAVCA, CCCTA, BAN, YAN, DUCCF, NMDA, DEEHA, Diphupar Naga Students’ Union, ENSUD, DALT, SN, NHRA, EDBA, Consumer Society, Petroleum Dealers’ Association, Chumoukedima Town Youth Organisation, and DDCF to pursue the matter.
The House resolved to serve 15 days’ time to the Nagaland state government to bring in the CBI for thorough investigation of the fuel adulteration issue. It also resolved that all the adulteration kingpins should be re-arrested.
In the event of failure by the state government to fulfil demand no.2, the Coordinating Committee will enforce bandh on national highways within the state in any form it deems fit.
The Co-ordination Committee on its part will submit the public memorandum to the state government through the office of the Chief Secretary at its convenient time. The public resolution will take effect only after the memorandum has been formally handed over to the Chief Secretary.
The joint statement issued today maintained that it has been months since the exposure on fuel adulteration was made by the ACAUT Nagaland and while the public had hoped that a CBI inquiry would be instituted by the state government, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) was instead set up on July 14 to probe the matter.
“Unfortunately, while the case had been dragging on at a painful pace, the kingpins involved in the fuel racket were all released on bail except for Mr. Ajay Prasad, arrested by the Kohima Police when his oil tanker was seized enroute to Imphal transporting Zero solvent (one of the key components for fuel adulteration).”
“The house was impressed with the following facts: The adulteration kingpins, namely, Srikanth, Dinanath, Noval, and Umesh are out on bail despite the very serious nature and sensitivity of the case. The other Kingpin, Ajay Prasad, was arrested by the Kohima police on 9/8/16 and his bail application was rejected by the CJM, Kohima, on 7/9/16. On 10th August, 2016, the court of CJM, Dimapur, ordered the release of 8 empty tankers from inside the adulteration site at Nagami Petrol Pump, Chumoukedima. Accordingly, the police carried out the order on 31th August. Interestingly, the SIT had no clue that the 8 tankers were ordered to be released prior to 30th August. Whereas the original police seizure memo listed only 7 empty tankers out of 11, the rest 4 tankers being laden with SK oil. And whereas the Investigative Officer, Diphupar Police station, without the presence of Chumoukedima public and ACAUT members as witnesses, entered the sealed premises and re-entered the total number of empty tankers as 8 in the memo. This was a serious procedural lapse. The Public Prosecutor was confronted with the anomaly by the ACAUT members. The PP expressed his helplessness to stop the 8 tankers from being released despite the adulteration premises being a crime scene. Very interestingly, the PP also admitted that he had not contested the bail application of the 4 kingpins nor was in a position to move for the cancellation of the given bail.”
