CBI director slams CB Bhave's supporters in MCX-SX licence case

With top ministers, businessmen and former bureaucrats coming out strongly in support of former Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) chairman C.B. Bhave after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) recently registered a preliminary enquiry (PE) against him, ex-wholetime Sebi director K.M. Abraham and others for alleged irregularities in granting licence to MCX Stock Exchange (MCX-SX) in 2008, the investigative agency broke its silence to MAIL TODAY on Wednesday.

Since the general sentiment was to the effect that a probe against such 'upright' public officers would further vitiate decisionmaking, CBI director Ranjit Sinha said: "Thousands of crores of investor money have been swindled by MCX and it was incumbent on the agency to look at the very procedure of registration of MCX."

Continuing his tirade, Sinha said the time has come for people to understand that the agency is completely independent and conducts its probes transparently.

"In the Ishrat Jehan case, the air was palpable with buzz that India's security apparatus will collapse if we go after Intelligence Bureau officers. Wind up the CBI if you are going to attack us for everything. When we do good, we are impaled; when we falter, we are attacked. How does this work? Why are we everyone's favourite whipping boys? For policy paralysis, we are targeted. It is the same story and same old song all the time. This way my entire tenure will go in apologising for this and that. My job is to investigate and I will continue to do that without favour or bias," Sinha said.

With MCX and Financial Technologies (India) Limited in the line of CBI's fire, Sinha added he is being criticised for anything and everything, including letting off Pawan Kumar Bansal.

La-Fin Financial Services Private Limited, promoted by Jignesh Shah and his wife Rupal, holds about 26.76-per cent stake in FTIL. The FTIL-MCX scandal has been playing out endlessly for some months now.

Sinha argued that the agency has become thick-skinned. "We take things in our stride now. We aren't vindictive; we know the circumstances under which we operate despite the virulent reaction from former bureaucrats. Wonder whether we will become an unbridled horse again and return to the animal kingdom?"

In association with Mail Today