March 22: The high court today rejected the anticipatory bail petition of former Enforcement Directorate officer Manoj Kumar, who came under fire for his alleged links with Rose Valley chief Gautam Kundu's wife during his probe into the company's deposit default scam.

Kumar - who was sent back to his parent cadre, customs, after allegations of his links with Kundu's wife surfaced - is apprehending arrest in connection with a case of extortion lodged against him by a chartered accountant, Kamal Somani.

Kumar had in May 2016 raided Somani's office. The chartered accountant had on February 28 lodged a complaint with Shakespeare Sarani police station alleging that a man named Pradeep Kumar Hirawat had been calling him since the raid and demanding money.

Hirawat, Somani has alleged, was an agent of Kumar.

The police started a case under the prevention of corruption act and Hirawat was arrested on March 1.

A division bench which was hearing Kumar's petition held that anticipatory bail could not be granted at this stage as a criminal investigation was on.

Appearing for the state, advocate-general Kishore Dutta submitted that Kumar used to extort money from Somani through Hirawat, who ran a business at Old China Bazar in central Calcutta.

"While interrogating Hirawat, the investigators have learnt that he used to extort money from Somani by threatening him and dropping the name of ED officer Manoj Kumar," the advocate-general said.

"Hirawat demanded Rs 75 lakh from Somani, who paid Rs 35 lakh. Hirawat had been threatening Somani regularly for the remaining amount."

Dutta said Kumar had called up Hirawat 66 times in two days.

Advocate Y.J. Yadav, who appeared for Kumar, submitted that his client had been falsely implicated.

Lalbazar had interrogated Kumar in February, after his name cropped up during a probe related to the seizure of Rs 1.42 crore in demonetised notes.

Around the same time, the police came across purported CCTV footage showing two persons resembling Kumar and Kundu's actress wife Subhra at the reception of a hotel in Delhi.

Reports of the alleged association between Kumar and Subhra, whose husband has been in custody since March 2015 in connection with the default scam, came to light in course of the probe into the cash haul.

Sources said Hirawat had collected air tickets from Somani for Kumar's travel with Subhra.