MP Namal Rajapaksa and former Krrish Group director Janaki Siriwardena were further remanded until 16 October on Tuesday, when both were produced before the Colombo Chief Magistrate’s Court in the Rs. 70 million Krrish bribery investigation.
Chief Magistrate Asanga S. Bodaragama made the order after submissions from the Commission to Investigate Allegations of Bribery or Corruption (CIABOC), NewsFirst reported. Prison officials produced Rajapaksa before court earlier in the day; Siriwardena, whose remand had been due to expire on Tuesday, was produced at the same proceedings.
The bail decision now has a date
Hiru News carries the one detail that makes Tuesday more than a procedural roll-forward: the magistrate also ordered that the bail decision will be delivered on 16 October, according to its filing.
Neither NewsFirst nor the Daily Mirror reports that the court fixed a bail ruling for the same date. On Hiru’s account, 16 October is not simply the next remand date but the day the question of release is to be decided for both suspects.
Where the case stands
Siriwardena, described by NewsFirst as the first suspect, was arrested on 24 September when she arrived at the commission to give a statement, and was remanded to 6 October at the same time the court cleared CIABOC to question Rajapaksa inside prison. Tuesday was that return date.
Rajapaksa was named a suspect in the Krrish matter on 28 September — the fourth in the case, on the commission’s numbering. He was already in custody at the time, and was later granted bail in the separate Airbus money laundering case on 30 September, which left the Krrish remand as the matter keeping him in prison.
The Indian government’s account of the money
The substantive allegation turns on where the Rs. 70 million came from.
At proceedings before the same Chief Magistrate on 29 September, investigating officers attached to the Bribery Commission told the court that the Indian Government had conveyed that the funds used in the Krrish transaction were allegedly linked to illicit financial activity, NewsFirst reports.
That is a claim about the origin of the money relayed from a foreign state, not a finding of any Sri Lankan court, and no outlet reports the channel it came through, the form it took, or what material accompanied it.
The Daily Mirror frames the underlying matter as an alleged Rs. 70 million bribe and says both suspects were arrested by CIABOC over it. Krrish is the Indian developer associated with the stalled Colombo high-rise project at the centre of the commission’s inquiry.
Not reported
No filing says why the remand was extended rather than bail being decided on Tuesday, what submissions CIABOC made, or whether the defence opposed the extension. None reports whether the investigation is awaiting further material from India, or whether the other suspects in the case were before the court.
None says whether the bail ruling promised for 16 October covers both suspects or only one, and no outlet carries any response from Rajapaksa’s lawyers to the Indian government’s characterisation of the funds.
