by Harish Gupta, National Editor, Lokmat Group
CBI did not handle PC's arrest with "finesse"
Veteran CBI officials surprised
Harish Gupta
New Delhi, Aug 21
The CBI neither showed maturity nor "finesse" in handling the arrest of former Home & finance Minister P Chidambaram after the day-long drama from his Jor Bagh residence tonight.
P Chidambaram had already reached at his residence after addressing the press conference at the AICC at 8 pm and obviously waited for the CBI team to land up there to hand-over the arrest warrants or detention. Within an hour, three dozen CBI officers landed there without realising that Jor Bagh has narrow lanes particularly where Chidambaram's house is located. Hundreds of media persons and congress workers had already surrounded the 115A house. The CBI team found it extremely difficult to even reach at the gate and make the guard open the door. the guard was scared to even open the door as massive crowds were there.
The CBI men jumped the wall and great difficulty in understanding the situation. The local police was not called to help out the crowd management. M L Sharma, special Director CBI said there was no "finesse" in agency's handling of the arresting a person like P Chidambaram. He said that the senior officials should have assessed the situation and handled with some maturity. This does not put anybody in good light.
He also blamed Chidambaram for not behaving with finesse either as he was there to surrender. Another former top CBI official also said that it had never happened in the history of the CBI that a person of such a stature allegedly involved in a corruption case has been handled like this. There was no need for such a high-drama from either side. But CBI should have done better preparations. It shows very poorly on handling sensitive issues.
Even the way former CBI director Alok Verma was raided midnight in his office and residence was avoidable.
