New Delhi, April 21
Three more persons have been arrested in the human trafficking case involving BJP MP Babubhai Katara, including his aide and a woman who allegedly trained the persons who were smuggled abroad on how to dodge the immigration officials.
Rajendra Kumar Gupta who claimed to be an aide of Katara and allegedly brokered deals on behalf of the MP, was arrested late last night by a special team of the Crime Branch.
Investigators said Rajendra used to strike deals with travel agents to facilitate travel of persons with Katara.
However, the police said Katara told them in his interrogation that Rajendra was not his aide and that he had masterminded the racket.
Kiran, another member of the racket who was also arrested last night, used to train the persons who were smuggled abroad on how to pose as the MP’s family members.
The third arrest made last night was that of Surender Lal Yadav, who the police said was the person who arranged for passports and visas.
A preliminary investigation into the case has revealed that Katara had taken persons to the UK and the US after taking money in 2005 and 2006.
Meanwhile, one of the arrested persons has named three other MPs to whom he had introduced travel agents suspected to be behind such rackets.
Sunderlal told a local court that he had introduced travel agents Mahesh Gupta and Rashid to TRS chief K. Chandrashekhar Rao, MP from Karimnagar in Andhra Pradesh, Mohammed Tahir Khan, BSP MP from Sultanpur
in Uttar Pradesh Ramswarup Koli, BJP MP from Bhayana in Rajasthan and late parliamentarian Ram Awadh.
Yadav said in the court of additional chief metropolitan magistrate Kamini Lau during remand proceedings that he did not know that they were travel agents but he had simply introduced them to the MPs.
He had also named Rashid, Hyderabad-based travel agent, who was introduced to Khan through his personal assistant Rajnath. For such introductions, he used to get money ranging from Rs 50,000 to Rs 1 lakh, said Yadav, who has been remanded in three days of police custody.
Yadav claimed that he had facilitated a meeting between the TRS chief with Rashid with help from former minister’s secretary Moorthy.
Tahir Khan denied any misdoing and said it was a conspiracy against him. He did not know why Yadav had taken his name.
The court has sent Rajender Kumar to five days police custody, besides sending his sister Kiran Dhar to 10 days judicial custody.
