Court extends Meiyappan, Vindoo custody till Monday

Mumbai: A Mumbai court Friday extended till June 3 the police custody of the IPL spot fixing scam accused Gurunath Meiyappan, Bollywood actor Vindoo Dara Singh Randhawa, bookie Prem Taneja and hawala operator Alpesh Patel.

The police sought further custody of the four to enable them to unravel the nexus between the accused and some absconder bookies like Sanjay Jaipur, Pawan Jaipur and Jupiter, also wanted in the fixing case. Additional Metropolitan Magistrate A.A. Khan granted the police plea, rejecting the defence lawyers` arguments that the offences under which the accused were booked were bailable, and they had aleady spent sufficient time in police custody. The police said that a team has been sent to Goa to bring bookie Paresh Bhatia, allegedly linked to some of the accused in the case. In a related development, Chennai hotelier Vikram Agarwal appeared before the Mumbai police in response to a summons issued two days ago, and recorded his detailed statement. Agarwal, who was allegedly running a betting a syndicate in Chennai, is said to be a link between Meiyappan and Vindoo, and also other Bollywood celebrities. IANS