GUWAHATI, May 12 � A number of officials of Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) and the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) are expected to be grilled by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in the next few days in connection with the oil theft racket busted on Tuesday.
The nine persons, who were arrested in this connection by the CID, have been remanded to judicial custody today.
A senior official of the CID revealed that the preliminary investigation into the case has virtually confirmed involvement of more persons, though it would be premature to pinpoint any name at this point of time.
�Such a big racket cannot operate without the connivance of insiders in the IOC and the NFR and we should be able to crack down on them soon,� the senior CID official claimed.
�Those arrested during our operation on Tuesday were just the on-field operators and the big fishes are yet to be netted. Some appears to be operating from inside the departments and some from outside,� the sources stated.
The racket, investigations so far revealed, involved a modus operandi that saw diesel being siphoned off from IOC tankers on roads and tracks and then sold in the black market. Consequently it was a loss to the public exchequer running into crores of rupees.
The sources further added that the revelation made by the nine arrested persons has provided some vital clues that could prove handy as the investigation progresses.
