Court allows Enforcement Directorate to question Satyam accu

A city court today granted permission to the Enforcement Directorate to record the statements of Satyam Computer Services founder B Ramalinga Raju and four other accused in the Satyam scam case.

In his order, XIV Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate K Sudhakar, in his orders, permitted the ED, coming under the Union Finance Ministry, to question the five accused for eight days from tomorrow in connection with the multi-crore scam in the IT firm.

The ED wanted to record the statements of Ramalinga Raju, his brother and former managing director B Rama Raju, former Satyam chief financial officer Vadlamani Srinivas, and two former auditors of Price Waterhouse S Gopalakrishnan and Talluri Srinivas in connection with possible violation of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA).

The Central agencies -- Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Serious Fraud Investigation Office -- have probed the fraud and also the State CB-CID till the CBI took over the investigation into the fudging of accounts which came to light in early January.