DK Ravi death case: Karnataka removes 3-month timeframe to save CBI probe

BENGALURU: The Karnataka government on Monday went into damage-control mode after the CBI turned down its request for a time-bound inquiry into the death of IAS officer DK Ravi. It quickly issued a fresh notification asking the agency to investigate the case at the earliest. Earlier, the government had set a three-month deadline for the inquest to be completed. Chief minister Siddaramaiah, who was in New Delhi, said the CBI rejected the request for the probe to be completed within 90 days, saying there's no legal provision for an investigation to be finished within a given timeframe. "So we decided to send a fresh notification." The CBI told the state government in a letter that it has no power to fix a timeframe. "The case is sensitive and complicated. It may not be possible to complete the investigation in three months as we have to start the investigation after collecting evidence," the missive said. The government said it set a deadline because some ministers in the Siddaramaiah cabinet were reportedly apprehensive the CBI may indulge in a political witch-hunt. Superseding its notification, the April 6, 2015 notification, said: "The agency shall investigate the matter and take necessary action at the earliest." The CBI told the state government it wanted a free hand in investigating the case, which triggered a political uproar. SK Pattanayak, additional secretary, home department, told TOI the new notification was sent to the CBI headquarters in New Delhi and to its local office on Monday morning. "The state government wanted the report come out early, but as the CBI didn't agree to this three-month timeframe, we removed it. It wanted us to issue a fresh notification without setting a timeframe." The 35-year-old IAS officer was found hanging from a ceiling fan in his Bengaluru apartment on March 17. CBI sources said the agency will check whether to take over the investigation or not. The decision to transfer the probe to the CBI came after Congress president Sonia Gandhi wrote to Ravi's wife promising a fair and transparent probe into the death. This came after Ravi's mother reportedly wrote an open letter to Sonia seeking an impartial probe. Ravi's family had raised doubts over the police claim that he committed suicide, saying that he was under "political pressure". Siddaramaiah had said there had never been a case where an incident had straight away been referred to CBI immediately. In a federal set-up, the Centre could not refer a case suo motu to the CBI; it could do so on a state's request. The state government had maintained that Ravi's death prima facie seemed to be a case of suicide, but the opposition and the family of the IAS officer refused to accept the theory. The order "In supersession of government order no HD 65 CID 2015 dated 24-03-2015, government hereby accords sanction for investigation into unnatural death of Sri DK Ravi ... The department officers/officials/others concerned shall hand over data/information/records as and when required by the Central Bureau of Investigation and cooperate with the investigation," reads the notification. Karnataka & CBI probes * In 1988, the CBI filed a case against former Karnataka home minister RL Jalappa for conspiring to murder Kerala lawyer Abdul Rasheed. Jalappa resigned. The CBI pinned charges on him for transferring a DCP to the area where the victim was killed, and for partially hiding information from the assembly. * In 1996, the CBI filed a case in 1996 against former Prime Minister PV Narasimha Rao and his home minister Buta Singh for buying JMM votes to win a no-confidence motion in 1993. Several Congress leaders from Karnataka were accused of taking cash from Bengaluru to New Delhi. -TOI