Mumbai, Nov 24 (Mumbai Mirror): The CBI secured Peter Mukerjea's custody till November 26 after it argued in the Esplanade court on Monday that it wanted more time to uncover some crucial leads in the Sheena Bora case. The CBI also told the court that Mukerjea was a tough nut to crack and thus the custody of 3 days wasn't enough. Mukerjea was arrested on November 20 and had been remanded in CBI custody till Monday.

Despite the defendant's argument that Peter was cooperative with the police and could be questioned by the CBI any time -- as per a recent Supreme Court judgement -- the local court accepted the prosecutor's prayer to extend his custody to complete the investigation.

While the court observed that there was nothing new in the prosecutor's remand application, special attention was drawn to the facts after Sheena's murder in 2012.

CBI's counsel additional solicitor general Anil Singh told the court that Peter and Indrani were in the UK together till April 22, 2012. On April 23 that year, Indrani flew down to Mumbai. Sheena was allegedly murdered the next day. Peter flew back to the city on April 26.

Peter and Indrani were constantly in touch with each other over the phone, Singh told the court. He also said that the couple's call data records revealed that the two were in touch with each other for long durations, ranging between 18 and 25 minutes, during, before and after the murder. This was unlike the usual pattern, the CBI said.

Singh further told the court that the couple flew to Goa on April 29 and returned to the city on May 1 that year before flying off to London again.

The CBI found that when in Goa, Peter and Indrani tried to gain access to Sheena's Gmail account but were unsuccessful in doing so.

Peter's lawyer, Amit Desai, defended Peter by saying that he had been cooperating with the police since day one. He stated that Peter had been present before the Mumbai police and CBI, for a total of over 40 days, whenever he was needed for questioning.

Referring to a recent Supreme Court judgement, where the court said that if the accused was cooperative with the police and if he/she wasn't likely to abscond, the police could avoid arresting the accused as arrest affects the witness and his/her family, Desai told the court that Peter was extremely cooperative and that an extension of his custody was not needed.

Desai also questioned the CBI's motive in arresting Peter all of a sudden even though he was being treated as a witness in the case.

The prosecutor also told the court that they are still to recover Sheena's missing possessions such as her phone, ATM card and her purse. They also told the police that they were yet to track down Peter's financial trail and were unable to do so in the short custody of three days which they had earlier acquired.

Peter has also not been able to give an explanation about why he lied to his son, Rahul Mukherjea. The CBI said that he wasn't cooperating with them and thus his custody needed to be extended for another 10 days.

The court said that a common man would have broken during the investigation and that Peter wasn't a commoner, and remanded Peter in CBI custody for three more days.