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Bhubaneswar: Charchit Mishra, the 39-year-old son of Odisha’s leading businessman Mahima Mishra, who was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation in connection with a ₹ 25 lakh bribery case, will stay in custody. A CBI court in Bhubaneswar on Wednesday rejected the bail request filed by the industrialist’s son who was arrested on Saturday on charges that their stevedoring company Orissa Stevedores Limited gave a ₹ 25 lakh bribe to a senior engineer of the Paradip Port Authority.
CBI arrested the port authority’s chief mechanical engineer Saroj Das, Mishra’s son Charchit and four others including a middleman over allegations that the port official allowed the company to get away without paying for damages to specialised conveyor belt.
Orissa Stevedores Limited, the biggest cargo company operating in Odisha, looks after unloading of cargo such as iron ore and other minerals, coal and steel. It has a near monopoly on the stevedoring operations of Paradip port, the second biggest port in India in cargo traffic handling and handles various cargo such as crude oil, iron ore, thermal coal, chrome ore, coking coal, manganese ore, charge chrome, ferrochrome, limestone, billets, finished steel, fertilizer, gypsum and containers.
On Wednesday when CBI produced the accused in the case before the judge, the court granted bail to builder Sisir Dash but rejected the other bail requests filed by Mishra, Debapriya Mohanty and Sumanta Rout.
The court, however, also rejected CBI’s pleas to seek more time to question the accused and conduct a voice test.
“CBI today sought remand for nine days and permission for voice sample recording. We opposed the two pleas and they were rejected by the court. Hearing the bail pleas, the court granted bail to Sisir Dash only and rejected the application of Charchit and Debapriya. After getting the order copy, we will decide whether to move the high court for bail or to re-apply for bail before the CBI court,” said Charchit’s lawyer Jayadip Pal.
In its FIR, CBI alleged that while unloading cargo, OSL officials damaged the conveyor belt operational in Paradip Port. The cost of repairing / replacement of the conveyor belt runs into crores. But the chief mechanical engineer of the port Saroj Das in conspiracy with Charchit Mishra, Sankha Subhra Mitra, a manager of Kolkata-based logistics company Karam Chand Thapar group and conduit Sumanta Rout got it repaired from the funds of Paradip Port Authority causing huge monetary advantage to private companies. Das allegedly demanded ₹ 60 lakh as bribe but eventually settled for ₹ 25 lakh.
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