Aarushi probe faces obstacle

Around two weeks after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), probing the 9-month-old Aarushi-Hemraj murder sought details on local criminals including hired killers, Noida police are yet to do the needful.

Around two weeks after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), probing the 9-month-old Aarushi-Hemraj murder sought details on local criminals including hired killers, Noida police are yet to do the needful.

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Noida police are, however, yet to determine who would furnish the information required by the CBI and by when. On the other hand, complained a few police officials, the CBI allegedly did not follow the procedure since the latter had directly approached the local police station chiefs with its request instead of routing it through senior officials.

Last month, the CBI team probing the double murder that occurred on the intervening night of May 15-16 last year had requested the Noida police seeking details on criminals, their modus operandi and fingerprints. “The fingerprints samples are to be matched from those gathered from the crime scene in the Aarushi-Hemraj murder case that did not match with those of the three case accused,” explained a CBI officer.

When asked the Superintendent of Police (city) AK Tripathi told HT: “The district unit of the State Crime Record Bureau (SCRB) would give the data required by the CBI.” Superintendent of police Ajay Sahdeo, who heads the local SCRB unit, however said, “I am not aware of this CBI request.”

CBI’s spokesperson Harsh Bhal said: “We do not tell the media anything about an ongoing probe.” The CBI’s focus on the suspected involvement of “criminals” now indicates it is looking beyond the three case accused: domestic helps Raj Kumar and Vijay Mandal, and medical assistant Krishna Nepali.