8-hour CBI examination for Rajeev Kumar ...... Kumar will return to the CBI office on Sunday when former Trinamul MP Kunal Ghosh is also expected to be present

Rajeev Kumar leaves the CBI office in Shillong on Saturday. Andrew W. Lyngdoh

Andrew W. Lyngdoh, TT, Shillong, 10 February 2019: The otherwise quiet and mundane CBI office here became the cynosure on Saturday as the investigating agency examined Calcutta police commissioner Rajeev Kumar for eight hours in connection with the Saradha deposit default probe.

Kumar will return to the CBI office on Sunday when former Trinamul MP Kunal Ghosh is also expected to be present.

Ghosh, who arrived here on Saturday, told The Telegraph over phone that he had been asked to appear at the CBI office at 10am. “I have been asked to appear tomorrow at 10am, and so I am here.”

Kumar’s advocate Biswajeet Deb said after the examination concluded around 7pm that the officer had “co-operated” with the CBI team.

“As of now, he is being examined as a witness in the case,” a CBI officer said in Delhi. The officer explained the nomenclature: a witness is “examined” but it turns into “questioning” if and when circumstantial evidence is gathered.

“Interrogation” is a higher level after the agency gets some form of direct proof or strong circumstantial evidence that links the suspect to the crime. Interrogation takes place only after taking the suspect into custody.

Kumar came to the CBI office in the Oakland area of Shillong around 10.50am. He was accompanied by advocate Deb, Calcutta additional commissioner of police (I) Jawed Shamim and deputy commissioner (special task force) Muralidhar Sharma.

There were reports that the CBI team, which consisted of 12 officers, had prepared for Kumar a questionnaire with 22 pages. When the examination started shortly after Kumar’s arrival, Deb, Shamim and Sharma were seen moving out of the CBI office. They later returned.

Kumar and the three others left the CBI office around 7.15pm.

To a query from journalists on whether Kumar had cooperated with the CBI, lawyer Deb said: “Of course, he has cooperated and he said he would cooperate. That is why he is here. There is no question of not cooperating.”