Param Bir vs Anil Deshmukh: The Bombay High Court will today hear the criminal PIL filed by former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh looking for a CBI probe against his former boss Anil Deshmukh. Days just after he was shunted out as the police commissioner, Param Bir wrote a sensational letter to chief minister Uddhav Thackeray, accusing state Home Minister Anil Deshmukh of operating an ‘extortion’ racket in Mumbai. In the letter to the CM, Param Bir claims that Deshmukh had asked police officers, which includes suspended assistant police inspector Sachin Vaze, to gather Rs one hundred crore per month from about 1750 bars and restaurants operating in Mumbai.
Param Bir filed the PIL on March 25. Appearing for the former leading cop, senior counsel Vikram Nankani on Tuesday pointed out the petition prior to a division bench of Chief Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice G S Kulkarni and sought urgent hearing on the matter. The Chief Justice asked Nankani about the prayers sought in the petition and if the PIL was maintainable. Nankani stated the most important prayer was for a CBI probe into the really serious allegations levelled by Param Bir against Anil Deshmuk. On maintainability, Nankani stated that he will satisfy the court with arguments.
Param Bir Singh had initially moved the Supreme Court, alleging he was removed as commissioner just after he complained to chief minister Uddhav Thackeray about the ‘corrupt malpractices’ of Anil Deshmukh. The leading court had termed the matter as rather really serious, but asked him to strategy the High Court. Param Bir then filed the PIL in the High Court, reiterating his allegations against Anil Deshmukh and looking for an ‘immediate, unbiased, impartial’ probe by the CBI.
In the HC, Param Bir has sought a path from the court to the CBI to safe CCTV footage of Anil Deshmukh’s residence from earlier this year prior to it was “destroyed”. In his letter to the chief minister, Param Bir stated that Sachin Vaze was named by Deshmukh to his official residence Dyaneshwar numerous occasions in the final handful of months and repeatedly instructed to help in collection of funds for the state Home Minister. Deshmukh, even so, rubbished his charge saying he did not meet any one among the stated period as he had contracted coronavirus and was admitted in hospital in Nagpur.
Param Bir has also sought a path from the court to the state government to create all records of communication received from IPS officer Rashmi Shukla in March 2020. In February final year, Rashmi Shukla had levelled really serious allegations of malpractices in police postings and transfers against Anil Deshmukh and also informed her superiors about it, but quickly afterwards she was transferred, Param Bir stated in his PIL.