A Delhi court has granted the CBI seven days’ custody of former CEO and MD of the National Stock Exchange (NSE), Chitra Ramkrishna, who was arrested by the agency in a 2018 case of bourse manipulation. The central agency arrested Ramkrishna on Sunday in what was the second high-profile arrest in the case. Last month, the agency had arrested Anand Subramanian, NSE’s former group operating officer and Ramkrishna’s deputy and confidante.
The CBI prosecutor sought the custody of Ramkrishna for 14 days before Additional Sessions Judge Sanjeev Aggarwal arguing that she was “evasive in her replies” and, despite being confronted with Subramanian, she “refused to even identify him. ”The prosecutor told the court that Ramkrishna had to be confronted with 2,500 emails between herself and the accused “which affected the decision making of the accused. ”On March 5, when Ramkrishna’s anticipatory bail was rejected, the court had pulled up the CBI, calling its investigation “lackadaisical” and noting that the agency had not taken action against the main beneficiaries of the scam.ASJ Sanjeev Aggarwal said, “Four years there was no action. The main beneficiaries are all enjoying. The FIR was lying in cold storage.”The CBI prosecutor told the court that the agency was moving forward with the investigation after “certain documents came to light”.