Amritsar:
A Punjab police team visited the residence of Ruchika Girhotra family lawyer Pankaj Bhardwaj to arrest him in a 2007 cheating case in Amritsar even as he claimed that the move was aimed at pressuring him to withdraw from certain cases involving high ups.
The police team from Amritsar came to his residence on Tuesday to arrest him but could not find him, the police said.
The case registered in 2007 pertains to land owned by Amritsar Improvement Trust, which was allegedly transferred in the name of a company in which Bhardwaj was one of the directors, they said.
It is alleged that the land was transferred through forged documents following which the Trust and a Gurgaon-based firm filed a complaint of cheating in 2007.
On the recent directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Amritsar police took action against about two dozen accused by presenting a chargesheet in the Amritsar court.
Questioning timing of the action, Bhardwaj told reporters outside the court premises "There is a lobby behind it."
He, however, did not name the lobby about which he was talking.
"It smells something fishy... yesterday Amritsar police team came here looking for me," he said, adding that "it had been done at the behest of some influential person as I am taking up cases against high ups."
"After the conviction of (former Haryana DGP SPS) Rathore in the Ruchika case some people even told me not to further pursue the case... but I will not get bogged down," he said.
"My name even does not figure in the FIR registered by the Amritsar police," he said, adding that he himself ceased to be one of the directors of the firm in 2006 and had also given back the money to the tune of Rs one crore.
The police team from Amritsar came to his residence on Tuesday to arrest him but could not find him, the police said.
The case registered in 2007 pertains to land owned by Amritsar Improvement Trust, which was allegedly transferred in the name of a company in which Bhardwaj was one of the directors, they said.
It is alleged that the land was transferred through forged documents following which the Trust and a Gurgaon-based firm filed a complaint of cheating in 2007.
On the recent directions of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Amritsar police took action against about two dozen accused by presenting a chargesheet in the Amritsar court.
Questioning timing of the action, Bhardwaj told reporters outside the court premises "There is a lobby behind it."
He, however, did not name the lobby about which he was talking.
"It smells something fishy... yesterday Amritsar police team came here looking for me," he said, adding that "it had been done at the behest of some influential person as I am taking up cases against high ups."
"After the conviction of (former Haryana DGP SPS) Rathore in the Ruchika case some people even told me not to further pursue the case... but I will not get bogged down," he said.
"My name even does not figure in the FIR registered by the Amritsar police," he said, adding that he himself ceased to be one of the directors of the firm in 2006 and had also given back the money to the tune of Rs one crore.
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