Vimal Negi case: CBI Court sends ASI Pankaj to 10-day judicial custody

The CBI Court today sent suspended Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) Pankaj Sharma to a 10-day judicial custody. He was arrested by the CBI team from Ghumarwin in Bilaspur district on September 14 for allegedly tampering with crucial evidence in the mysterious death of former chief engineer of Himachal Pradesh Power Corporation Limited (HPPCL), a case that is being probed by the CBI. He will now remain under judicial custody till September 26.

Sharma was presented in court today, where the CBI sought custodial interrogation, but he was remanded to judicial custody. During the hearing, the court rejected his bail plea. His counsel had argued that the CBI, during a recent hearing in the high court, had stated that Pankaj was not required in the case.

The next hearing of the case has been scheduled for September 26 and will be held via video conferencing.

Sharma, who was earlier sent to one-day remand by the court on Monday, has been accused of hiding and tampering with crucial evidence in the case — a pen drive that he found from the pocket of Vimal Negi’s body. Though not part of the Special Investigation Team (SIT) constituted to find Negi, Sharma had visited the site on the day when Negi’s body was found and had taken possession of the pen drive, which he had allegedly formatted later.

A local fisherman had recorded Sharma, while he was discussing the pen drive with some person on a phone call. He was later suspended from duty on May 19, just four days before the case was handed over to CBI.

The CBI, during the investigation, had questioned Sharma multiple times. During this period, he was kept under police security and CCTV surveillance at Police Lines, Kaithu, in Shimla. He was later allowed to shift to his government residence in Shimla after the directions of the high court on September 5.