Jamshedpur police is counting on a DVR ( digital video recorder) sent to the Ranchi-based forensic science laboratory (FSL) to make fresh arrests in the Hotel Alcor case.
Family members of Hotel Alcor's owner and other businessmen are fighting a legal battle for bailing them out. All of the accused have been lodged in Ghaghidih Central Jail since April 27.
Police maintain that several other bigwigs, including some senior officials of the Jharkhand Bijli Vitran Nigam Ltd (JBVNL), were regular visitors at the Bistupur-based hotel for merry-making. They are certain to face police action once the DVR report comes.
City SP Subhash Chandra Jat. who is supervising the case, said that they had sent the DVR for an analysis at the FSL in Ranchi a few days after the case was registered with the Bistupur thana on April 26, but the due to the lockdown that prevailed in April and May, the analysis could not come in time.
"As work at the FSL has resumed, we expect the report soon. Once the report arrives, we will identify the rest and arrest them accordingly," Jat told The Telegraph Online. He pointed out that fresh arrests need strong material evidence, which in this case will be provided by the pending report.
Acting on a tip off, police raided Alcor Hotel on the evening of April 25, and found a group of three businessmen busy at the hotel spa, leading them to arrest all on the charge of lockdown violation.
The then OC of the Bistupur thana, Rajesh Prakash Sinha had released the three, RK Mangotia, Rajat Jaggie and Deepak Agrawal on PR bond the same night. But after pressure mounted by a section of local media the then senior SP Anoop Birtharay ordered a fresh investigation into the case.
The police discovered that several other people, mostly businessmen, used to visit the hotel during the lockdown for merry making. The police also found a 23-year-old girl from one of the hotel rooms. It was also found out that she shared a relationship with Sharad Poddar, a businessman who owns four mini-steel plants located in the adjoining Seraikela-Kharsawan district.
The police subsequently scanned CCTV footage of all the 69 rooms of the hotel and found that several other people, including the three who were released on PR bond, used to visit the place for the girl who was brought from Calcutta. The police finally arrested seven people, including the hotel owner Rajiv Duggal and the girl under the Immoral Traffic Act.
The district and sessions judge have already granted bail to the girl, while the remaining six are still in jail.
As the police had sealed the hotel, family members of Duggal had on Monday met the East Singhbhun deputy commissioner Ravi Shankar Shukla and requested permission for reopening the hotel. The family members are also trying to secure bail for Duggal (64) from the Ranchi High Court.
Shushant Sharma, one of the managers of Alcor Hotel told The Telegraph Online, "we will file the petition with the High Court for Duggal on Friday, but do not know when he will be granted the bail finally. The matter is getting complicated further."
But a police officer who is also a part of the investigation said that a section of industrialists having induction furnace-based mini-steel plants had turned the Alcor Hotel into an "adda", where underhand dealing with the officials of the JBVNL used to be struck. He said induction furnaces are run by electricity only, and hence such mini-steel plants consume huge amounts of electricity. The owners allegedly sought benefits from some JBVNL officials by entertaining them at the hotel.
"We have already nabbed some such industrialists, but now we will find out the JBVNL officials who also used to visit the hotel. This is the reason that we are waiting for the DVR report from the FSL, Ranchi," said the police officer on condition of anonymity.
