Bhubaneswar, May 6: Amid rising controversy over an alleged criminal-police nexus, chief minister Naveen Patnaik today said that a Lokpal probe has been initiated to look into the link issue.

Though the chief minister evaded most question related to the Biranchi Das murder, he said: “The Lokpal is probing into the nexus angle. Stringent action would be taken against those found guilty.”

Addressing the media today, police commissioner Binay Behera denied meeting gangster Sandeep Acharya, alias Raja, the key accused in the murder of Biranchi Das. “I never met Raja Acharya. Reports alleging that I met him is not correct,” said the police commissioner.

He added that he had not met Das either. “I saw Das’s body in the hospital on the day he died,” he added.

Behera was the first officer in Orissa to hint at a criminal-police nexus and drew the government’s attention to it after the murder.

“I heard that a newspaper quoted Raja saying that he (Raja) had met me at a city hotel where a ‘conspiracy’ was hatched to eliminate Das on April 13,” Behera said, adding that this was Raja’s bid to divert attention from himself. This is the first time that Behera’s name has cropped up in relation to the case.

“We will be putting him under the narco-analysis test, as we fear that he will take more names to mislead the police,” he added.

A day after Raja’s arrest, the Orissa police arrived in Panaji today to take the accused into custody. The team, headed by assistant commissioner of police Suresh Mohapatra, will be taking Raja to Bhubaneshwar either today or tomorrow. “We are yet to decide,” Mohapatra told reporters outside the court.