CBI has identified for closer scrutiny 500 phone calls from out of the 1,000 intercepted calls mainly among the four arrested accused in the alleged Rs 10 crore Railway bribery scandal.

As the scandal put a big question mark on the future of Railway Minister P K Bansal, CBI sources said today that over 1,000 phone calls were intercepted during the two-month long surveillance on arrested member of Railway Board Mahesh Kumar and Bansal’s nephew Vijay Singla.

The sources said these calls were among four key players in the scandal- Kumar, Singla and middlemen Manjunath and Sandeep Goyal.

The sources said the analysis of the telephonic conversation showed that the four key players were frequently calling each other on May 3, the day when Kumar was arrested by CBI sleuths in Mumbai.

The sources said that of the 1,000 intercepted calls, 500 have been shortlisted for intense scrutiny.

Kumar was in between elevated from GM (West) to Member (Staff) in Railway Board, a post in which he was not very apparently interested.

CBI has so far arrested eight accused in the case.