Former deputy secretary in Maharashtra government and an accused in the Adarsh Society scam, P V Deshmukh, today approached the Bombay high court seeking for CBI to defreeze his bank accounts.

Deshmukh and his family's bank accounts in Vijaya Bank and Bank of Maharashtra were attached by CBI after it registered a case on January 29 in the Adarsh Housing Society scam.

During searches, CBI had recovered incriminating documents and Rs 23 lakh in cash from his residence in the neighbouring Thane district.

Apart from defreezing of the bank accounts, Deshmukh in his petition has also sought for CBI to release cash of Rs 23 lakh recovered from his residence.

"The cash recovered is accounted for. Some of it belongs to my son Harshvardhan and his wife Veera," the petition stated.

A division bench of Justices P V Hardas and M N Gilani directed CBI to file its reply to the petition in two weeks.

CBI in its FIR had accused Deshmukh of having abused his official power by fraudulently communicating to the BMC (local civic body) that the ministry of environment and forest had given No Objection Certificate to Adarsh Society for constructing a residential building.

Apart from Deshmukh, the FIR had also named former Maharashtra chief minister Ashok Chavan, retired army officials, government officials on charges of criminal conspiracy, fraud and misuse of their official powers.