Former Director General of Police (DGP) of Gujarat RB Sreekumar was arrested on June 25, 2022 along with notorious ‘activist’ Teesta Javed Setalvad on charges of fabricating evidence, committing forgery, and criminal conspiracy.
The arrest came a day after the Supreme Court once again upheld the clean chit given to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the 2002 Gujarat Riots case.
RB Sreekumar who is currently a leader of Arvind Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party was also former Deputy Director of Intelligence Bureau.
Apart from being accused of foisting false cases and fabricating evidence in the Gujarat Riots case, the ex-IPS officer had also played an important role in framing Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) scientist Nambi Narayanan.
Nambi Narayanan Case Timeline
In November 1994, Narayanan and his other scientist collegues in charge of the cryogenic technology transfer from Russia, were arrested by the Kerala Police on false charges of espionage. They were physically under the custory of IB officers. The case was eventually transferred to the CBI which concluded that the case was a sham.
Although the CBI submitted a closure report in 1996 stating that the espionage case was fabricated, the Communist government in Kerala had kept the issue lingering for decades.
The then CPI(M)-led government ordered more investigations which was struck down by the Supreme Court in in May 1998.
In September 1999, the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) passed strictures against the government of Kerala for having damaged Narayanan’s distinguished career in space research along with the physical and mental torture to which he and his family were subjected.
The Supreme Court in 2018 ruled that Narayanan was not guilty of any of the espionage charges as accused by the Kerala Police and the bench called the case was “unnecessary” and that “he was implicated.” It also appointed a three-member panel headed by a former Supreme Court judge DK Jain to probe the arrest and torture of former space scientist Nambi Narayanan in the ‘ISRO spy scandal’ that turned out to be fake.
On 14 April 2021 the Supreme Court of India ordered a CBI probe into the involvement of police officers in the conspiracy after the DK Jain Committee report pointed out a conspiracy.
The Nambi Narayanan episode marks the darkest chapter in the history of Indian space as it curtailed India’s emergence as a space power by atleast two decades.
Role Of Sreekumar
RB Sreekumar has been named as one of the 18 accused in the FIR regsitered by the CBI along with former Kerala DGP Siby Mathews. Sreekumar was on deputation in the Intelligence Bureau during the espionage case.
The Kerala police had initiated the probe acting on inputs received from the IB.
Nambi Narayanan and D Sasikumaran were subjected to horrendous mental and physical torture by the then Kerala police and Intelligence Bureau officers.
Deposing before the CBI in August 2021, Nambi Narayan told the investigating officers about his encounter with Sreekumar where the latter had threatened him for not obliging to a personal favour.
“When Sreekumar was commandant at VSSC, he had requested me to appoint his niece or nephew to a post at Thumba, but since the process was fair, she/he could not be selected. Then Sreekumar had come to my office to express his anger to which I had asked him to go out else I would call the police. Sreekumar had said I will regret this in the future.”, Nambi Narayanan had told the CBI.
“I was taken into custody and thereafter, the real mental agony, physical torture which was endless, started. A lot of police personnel in their uniforms and civil dress were interrogating me and asking nonsense questions. If there was a delay in answering, they would start a physical assault by way of slaps and even kicks. When my interrogation was going on in police custody, two or three officers of the Kerala police along with Sreekumar, were present and were laughing.”, D Sasikumaran had told in his deposition before the CBI.
It is interesting to note that former Kerala Former Police chief Siby Mathews, the prime accused in the ISRO spy case had also accused former Intelligence Bureau deputy director RB Sreekumar of forcing him to arrest Nambi Narayanan.
Despite multiple reports and the Supreme Court vindicating Nambi Narayanan and other scientists, Sreekumar accused the CBI of acting like “defence lawyers” to them. He also called Nambi Narayanan as “not a great scientist” in an interview to Times Now in April 2021.
It is this RB Sreekumar who has been inducted into the AAP.
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