WB CM aide murder: Ballia youth arrested by WB police walks free after CBI arrests 'real' Raj Singh

Raj Singh, arrested here by a West Bengal Special Investigation Team (SIT) in connection with the killing of an aide to West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari, returned home on Thursday after being cleared by the CBI and Barasat court in West Bengal.

The CBI had petitioned the Barasat court for Singh's release, saying he had been arrested in a case of mistaken identity. The agency, which assumed control of the investigation from the SIT, arrested the ''real'' Raj Kumar Singh in Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh, on May 18.

Acting on the CBI's plea, the Barasat court in West Bengal ordered Raj Singh's release. He returned to his home in Ballia on Thursday.

Chandrakant Rath, Adhikari's personal assistant, was shot dead in Madhyamgram on May 6, two days after the declaration of the fiercely fought West Bengal Assembly election results.

The CBI took over the investigation into Rath's murder from the West Bengal Police following a request from the state government.

Officials said the agency had constituted a seven-member special investigation team, led by a deputy inspector general from its Special Crime unit in Delhi and comprising investigators drawn from several divisions.

After returning home, Singh alleged that he was subjected to mental harassment in custody and claimed personnel from West Bengal's Special Operations Group (SOG) threatened him with a staged encounter and pressured him to confess.

Speaking to PTI at his residence in Ballia's Anand Nagar locality, Singh, who identified himself as the state general secretary of the Akhil Bharatiya Kshatriya Mahasabha, reiterated that he had no role in the killing and had been falsely implicated in the high-profile case.

''When the CBI conducted its investigation, I was found innocent. I have also got a clean chit from the court,'' he said, demanding an inquiry into the conduct of officials involved in his arrest and interrogation.

''Officials were saying they would shoot me. Whenever someone came near me, they would quietly show me a weapon. They were trying to intimidate me,'' he alleged.

Following his arrest on May 10 in Ayodhya, Singh's mother, Jamvanti Singh, had publicly maintained that her son was innocent and claimed to possess CCTV footage showing he was in Ballia on the day of the murder.

She had alleged that she and her son were detained by an SOG team while returning from Ayodhya after attending a wedding and visiting a dargah in Ambedkar Nagar district.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)