Commissionerate police today arrested Subash Agarwal, chairman and founder of BSE listed, ARSS Infrastructure Projects Ltd on charges of assaulting a senior railway official.
“Subhash Agarwal has been arrested and will be forwarded to the court. Further investigation into the case is on”, said RP Sharma, twin city police commissioner.
Officials said, Agarwal had allegedly engaged goons who shot at Ajay Kumar, joint general manager of projects at Rail Vikash Nigam Limited (RVNL). The railway official was probing irregularities in implementation of the Sukinda-Anugul Railway project.
Police said, Kumar, while inspecting the project work, had imposed penalty of Rs 25 lakh on the contractors, Woodhill-Hillway of Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. Woodhill-Hillway, however, had sublet the work to ARSS.
Kumar and Agarwal had a heated exchange of words in February this year following which Kumar had imposed another fine of Rs 3,30,000 on ARSS Infrastructure on May 21.
Police suspect this conflict between the railway official and Agarwal formed the background for launching of attack on the former. Three bike borne assailants had shot at Kumar’s vehicle on Saturday in Chandrasekharpur area. However, the Kumar had escaped unhurt.
When local residents reached the spot hearing the gunshot, the miscreants fled from there. Later, Kumar had lodged a case at the Chandrasekharur police station.
Agarwal denied the charges levelled against him and pleaded ignorance. “Someone is trying to frame me”, he said.
Prasanta Patnaik