Fire officer caught taking Rs 50,000 bribe

TNN Aug 8, 2012

NEW DELHI: The CBI on Tuesday caught a fire officer while taking bribe from a hotel owner in Rani Bagh area for giving fire clearance.

CBI sources said Delhi Fire Service officer Rajmal Khokar posted in Rohini had allegedly demanded Rs 1.50 lakh from the owner of one Royal Mirage hotel in the Rani Bagh area. After getting complaint in this regard, CBI officials laid down a trap.

When Khokar was allegedly accepting an installment of Rs 50,000 from the hotel manager, he was caught red handed by the team of CBI officials.

When contacted, owner of the hotel Vijay Pal Singh said Khokar was allegedly demanding the money for fire clearance from August 2 .

"He demanded Rs 5 lakh from me despite my hotel having a clearance valid till 2014 earlier," said Singh.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-08-08/delhi/33099806_1_fire-clearance-cbi-officials-fire-officer

Ex-cop took bribe in 2004, gets year’s RI

TNN | Aug 3, 2012

NEW DELHI: A trial court has sentenced a retired assistant commissioner of police to one year rigorous imprisonment for accepting Rs 5,000 as bribe eight years ago from a subordinate, who used to process issuance of firecrackers licences for the festive season. 

Special CBI Judge Pradeep Chaddah awarded one year jail to 65-year-old Hawa Singh, the then ACP in Delhi Police, after convicting him under various sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act. 

While imposing a fine of Rs 50,000 on the convict, the court said, "I have given my considered thought. Convict is 65 years old retired public servant. Court must make an effort to strike balance between interest of society and age and related circumstances of the convict. Keeping in mind his age and background, I sentence convict Hawa Singh to undergo one year rigorous imprisonment." 

Singh was facing trial since 2004 on the allegation that while working as ACP (public grievances cell) in the Delhi Police, he had accepted Rs 5,000 bribe from a sub-inspector Harminder Singh, who was involved in the process for issuance of cracker licences for Diwali. 

"The complainant (Harminder), instead of complying with the illegal and illegitimate extortion, made a complaint to CBI and got the convict trapped while accepting Rs 5,000," the court noted while sentencing the retired ACP. 

Harminder, who was then posted in the office of DCP North District, in his complaint to the CBI said that before issuing the crackers licence for the festive seasons, he used to get signatures of Additional DCP North on the documents. 

The CBI had alleged that the then ACP used to repeatedly ask Harminder to give him money and crackers in return for the signatures. 

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/Ex-cop-took-bribe-in-2004-gets-years-RI/articleshow/15333750.cms

Colonel among six arrested for NDA recruitment scam

TNN | Jun 25, 2012

NEW DELHI: The CBI busted a major recruitment scam in the prestigious National Defence Academy (NDA) and arrested six people, including a serving colonel, for allegedly receiving bribes for jobs and claimed to have recovered Rs 1.76 crore from different locations in connection with the case.

The agency raided 14 places in Pune, Mumbai, Gurgaon and Sonepat, and recovered cash which was allegedly taken by officials and their touts for recruiting subordinate staff like cooks, gardeners, library and laboratory attendants, cadet orderly and lower division clerks, officials said.

Among those arrested are Col Kulbir Singh, staff officer to NDA Commandant Lt Gen Jatinder Singh, NDA employee Ramesh Gaikwad, Bal Kishen Kanojia -- who runs a food stall in Pune, his employee Vishnu Sharma and two alleged touts Manoj Sheetal Kar and Dattatre Sheetal Kar. Col Singh, who belongs to the Guards regiment, was arrested from the Colaba military station.

All the six were produced before a CBI court in Pune which remanded them to custody till July 2.

'Jobs went for Rs 4 lakh bribe'

"The staff officer in conspiracy with the other accused obtained illegal gratification of Rs 3-4 lakh from each candidate to give them appointment for subordinate staff like cooks, gardeners, lab attendants, library attendants and cadet orderly," a CBI spokesperson said.

The accused allegedly took signatures of those who had agreed to pay the bribe on blank sheets and later filled them with correct answers through fraudulent means, he said.

CBI said while Rs 4 lakh was seized from the residence of Col Singh, another Rs 82 lakh was seized from the house of an associate of the Army officer. Rs 50 lakh was recovered from Kanojia and Rs 18 lakh from Gaikwad's residence. Rs 3 lakh and Rs 3.20 lakh were recovered from the houses of Manoj Sheetal Kar and Vishnu Sharma respectively, the CBI official said.

The agency also claimed to have seized a list of candidates' names and interview letters from the residence of Kanojia and a list of those who had paid bribe from Sharma's house. The statements of candidates will be recorded soon, the official said.

NDA had in February invited applications to appoint 40 subordinate staff.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Colonel-among-six-arrested-for-NDA-recruitment-scam/articleshow/14379493.cms

Retired DDA officer jailed for graft

TNN | Jul 26, 2012

NEW DELHI: A retired senior officer of the DDA was sentenced to three years of rigorous imprisonment by a trial court for taking a bribe of Rs 2,000 for expeditious execution of conveyance deed of a flat.

Special CBI judge Dharmesh Sharma sentenced Gurcharan Singh (64), former assistant director of DDA in its MIG (H) section, after convicting him under various provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act.

"The accused Gurcharan demanded and accepted the bribe, while the accused peon J B Joshi accepted the bribe for and on behalf of Gurucharan in pursuance of a criminal conspiracy," the judge said, and imposed a penalty of Rs 75,000 on the convict.

The court also sentenced Joshi to a year in jail, besides imposing a fine of Rs 15,000 on the DDA peon. His sentence was set off against the period he remained in jail during the trial.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/Retired-DDA-officer-jailed-for-graft/articleshow/15154012.cms

Official, peon get 2 years’ jail for Rs 150 bribe

Shibu Thomas, TNN Jun 10, 2012

MUMBAI: Surging inflation in the past 14 years could not save a government officer and his peon from jail for taking bribes, as the Bombay high court threw out their plea that the amount of Rs 150 was trivial and thus they should not be convicted on corruption charges.

"This court has no hesitation to observe that the amount involved, Rs 150, was not a trivial amount as it was demanded and accepted in 1998. In those days, ordinary labour was getting hardly Rs 30 per day as wages," said Justice T V Nalawade, upholding the conviction of Ramrao Kale (48), a sub-registrar, and Shivrao Deshmukh, the peon. The court held that the trial court was right in sentencing the duo to two years in jail.

150 bribe sought for property deal

The accused had refuted the bribe accusation, claiming that the money was donated by complainant Subhas Murthe for the Flag Fund and for buying Indira Vikas Patra. In their defence, they produced a receipt for Rs 50 for the Flag Fund. But the court ruled it was fake.

Murthe, who had gone to register a property sale deed at the office of the sub-registrar in Jalgaon on April 6, 1998, was asked to cough up Rs 150 to get the job done even after paying the registration charges and getting the documents stamped. Murthe told officer Kale and Deshmukh that he did not have the money on him and would return with it the next day.

He immediately approached the anti-corruption bureau, which laid a trap. The duo was literally caught red-handed accepting the bribe after a dye secretly put on the notes that Murthe gave them was found on Deshmukh's hands and shirt pocket. Upholding the trial court ruling, the HC cautioned the government against keeping officers in the same post even after bribe allegations have been levelled against them.

"The circumstances show that the accused misused his position and created the (Flag Fund) record after the date of trap. It is unfortunate that the competent authority does not take necessary steps when a trap becomes successful. In such cases, it is always desirable to immediately suspend the employee or (ensure) charge of work is handed over to some other person for some time," said Justice Nalawade. The court added that once charges of illegal gratification were established, the burden of proving it was not a bribe was on accused.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-06-10/india/32155156_1_bribe-peon-trial-court

Sebi DGM, middleman in CBI net on bribery charges

TNN Jun 2, 2012

NEW DELHI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has arrested a deputy general manager (DGM) of Securities and Exchange Bureau of India (Sebi) and a middleman on bribery charges. Sebi had barred an Ahmedabad-based share trading company from trading last September for alleged market manipulation using Global Depository Receipts (GDR) issues and initiated an enquiry against the firm.

"The DGM, Avarjeet Singh of Sebi, who was conducting investigation had issued show cause notice to the firm of the complainant. The complainant came in contact with the Mumbai-based middleman Ashok Mehta, who assured to get the work done in favour of the complainant, claiming close contact with the Sebi official," CBI said in a statement. It said Mehta had allegedly demanded Rs 25 lakh from the complainant on behalf of the Sebi official.

"The complainant also met the Sebi official who asked him to give the bribe amount to the middleman. The accused asked for Rs 10 lakh as the first installment of bribe. As the complainant did not want to pay the bribe, he lodged complaint with CBI," the statement added. The agency laid a trap and the middleman who came to Ahmedabad for taking delivery of the bribe was caught while accepting illegal gratification of Rs 10 lakh on behalf of Singh.

The Sebi official was also arrested. Searches were conducted at the premises of the middleman and the SEBI official in both Mumbai and New Delhi. The accused were produced in court, the CBI said.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-06-02/india/31983686_1_sebi-official-middleman-cbi

Delhi Development Authority official gets 3 years in jail for graft

TNN May 18, 2012

NEW DELHI: A trial court has sentenced a DDA official to three years imprisonment for taking Rs 1,000 bribe to allow illegal construction. The court said a public servant cannot expect leniency on the ground that the bribe he took was a very small amount.

"It is pertinent to mention here that a person who is caught accepting bribe cannot be dealt with lenient view on the ground that he accepted a very small amount, for the reason that when the accused was caught, this might have been one of those innumerable occasions when he had accepted bribe," Special CBI Judge Dinesh Kumar Sharma said while also imposing a fine of Rs 50,000 on the convict.

The convict Raj Kumar Verma, who worked in Delhi Development Authority in 2009, had demanded bribe to allow unauthorized construction at the premises of Nanhe Ram, a businessman.

The Special Judge also said the accused cannot benefit by the plea that the construction was unauthorized as that does not give him a right to demand bribe. "Be that as it may be, even if the complainant (Nanhe Ram) was raising unauthorized construction, it would not give the right to the accused or anybody to ask for the bribe.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-05-18/delhi/31764546_1_bribe-illegal-construction-dda-official

Tamil Nadu IPS officer held in Delhi for Paazee scam

A Selvaraj & Neeraj Chauhan, TNN | May 3, 2012

CHENNAI/NEW DELHI: The CBI on Wednesday arrested a top IPS officer of the Tamil Nadu cadre, Pramod Kumar, from Delhi's Panchsheel Enclave for allegedly conspiring to get a bribe of Rs 10 crore from a private firm accused of duping the public of over Rs 800 crore.

Inspector general of police Pramod Kumar, 46, is a 1989-batch IPS officer. He will be produced before a designated court in Chennai on Thursday and sent to Puzhal prison. The officer has been on the run for the past several months, said a CBI officer, adding that Paazee Forex Trading Co in Tirupur had allegedly duped investors to the tune of Rs 829 crore.

Earlier, CBI teams raided his apartment at the SAF Games Village in Koyambedu on March 22. Subsequently, police teams searched his house twice in connection with the Paazee case. The officer wasn't home when the CBI raided it.

"I am innocent. I am seeking pardon from God. I have done nothing wrong. I was informed about the raid at my house. I came to Delhi on official duty," Kumar told TOI.

CBI sources said they had taken away bundles of documents from his house after the raid lasting three hours. Senior CBI officials, however, refused to share any information.

The seized material will be scrutinized before being submitted to the court. If we need any clarification in connection with the seized material, we will ask Pramod Kumar," aCBI officer said.

Pramod Kumar was IGP when the scam surfaced in 2008. According to police, K Kathiravan, a reporter with a Tamil daily in Tirupur, and his son, K Mohanraj, started the forex company in the hosiery town of Tirupur in Tamil Nadu in 2008.

Soon, Chennai-based A Kamalavalli joined as managing director of the firm. With agents appointed all over Tamil Nadu, the company collected nearly Rs 111 crore from depositors. Agents got 15% commission on every deposit while 10% commission went to the depositor.

In 2010, CID sleuths arrested those involved in the case. During questioning, the economic offences wing registered 10,332 cases against the Paazee Company for cheating Rs 211 crores of depositors. A few depositors approached the Madras high court seeking CBI inquiry, which was ordered last month.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Tamil-Nadu-IPS-officer-held-in-Delhi-for-Paazee-scam/articleshow/12973788.cms

Former judge gets 3 years' rigorous imprisonment in graft case

TNN Apr 29, 2012

NEW DELHI: A former trial court judge has been sentenced to three years' rigorous imprisonment for taking Rs 2,000 as bribe in a 26-year-old case. Saying a judge's ethical firmness is the need of the hour, special CBI judge V K Maheshwari held former judge Gulab Tulsiyani (74) guilty of demanding and accepting bribe for disposal of a factory challan case in 1986. Tulsiyani was a metropolitan magistrate at Patiala House court at that time.

"Judicial office is an office of public trust, therefore, high integrity, honesty and ethical firmness is the requirement of society from the judge. A judge's conduct is expected to be judged by standards higher than that expected from any other public servant. The confidence in judiciary is getting shattered day by day. Today judiciary is suffering from self-inflicted wounds... " the court said while imposing a fine of Rs 50,000 on Tulsiyani.

The court, however, suspended its sentence till May 28 after the convict expressed his wish to appeal against his conviction. While releasing him on interim bail on a personal bond of Rs 50,000 with a surety of the same amount, it asked Tulsiyani to appear before it on May 29.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-04-29/delhi/31475962_1_trial-court-judge-patiala-house-court-rigorous-imprisonment

Ex-BJP chief gets 4 years in jail for ‘political graft’

Smriti Singh, TNN Apr 29, 2012

NEW DELHI: Former BJP chief Bangaru Laxman was on Saturday sentenced to four years' imprisonment for having accepted Rs 1 lakh as bribe from a fake arms dealer who sought his help to bag an order from the defence ministry. The trial court rejected his plea for leniency and said he was guilty of "political corruption, and had sought to compromise national security for selfish ends".

Special CBI judge Kanwaljeet Arora emphasized that Laxman headed the BJP, the largest constituent of the then NDA government at the Centre, when he accepted the bribe from a counterfeit company to push the sale of hand-held thermal imagers, a fictitious device.

Laxman, who was caught on camera in a sting operation accepting bribe 11 years ago, is the first president of a national party to have been jailed for corruption, something that can embarrass the BJP in its anti-graft campaign targeting the Congress.

The case assumes significance because the court rejected the argument that Laxman, the only dalit to have headed the BJP, was a victim of entrapment, saying while the methods of those who carried out the sting may have been objectionable, their purpose was not.

Rejecting the demand for leniency on grounds of age, health and "unblemished record of public life" of four decades, the special CBI judge said Laxman had agreed to compromise the security of the nation" for his personal interests.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-04-29/india/31475551_1_fake-arms-dealer-bangaru-laxman-sting-operation

Ex-AIIMS doc took bribe, gets 3-year RI

TNN | Feb 7, 2012

NEW DELHI: A trial court has sentenced a former medical superintendent of All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) to three years' rigorous imprisonment for accepting bribe in 1998 from a private company, which used to supply cotton to the medical institute. 

Special judge B R Kedia convicted 71-year-old Dr R C Anand under various sections of Prevention of Corruption Act and also slapped a fine of Rs 30,000 on him. The court also convicted a former junior store officer at AIIMS for destruction of evidence. Vyas Narayan Singh, 66, was awarded a one-year jail term and was fined Rs 10,000 by the court after the prosecution proved the allegations against the duo "beyond reasonable doubt". 

The case dates back to 1998 when Sageer Ahmed Khan, owner of Shifaa Scientific Fibre, a company which used to supply cotton to AIIMS, filed a complaint with the anti-corruption branch against the duo, alleging that Dr Anand was demanding Rs 5,000 as bribe for the tender he was given. 

He also alleged that Dr Anand demanded a commission of 2% on the entire future contract. The anti-corruption branch then laid down a trap and all the conversations of Dr Anand were recorded with the complainant. 

Dr Anand was arrested while accepting a bribe of Rs 10,000.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/delhi/Ex-AIIMS-doc-took-bribe-gets-3-year-RI/articleshow/11786616.cms

Ex-Addil Commissioner of Income Tax sent to jail for 4 yrs

New Delhi, Feb 1, 2012, (PTI):

A former Additional Commissioner of Income Tax, arrested by CBI for demanding Rs one lakh as bribe for clearing a tax return matter, has been sentenced to four years in jail by a Delhi court.

Special CBI Judge Talwant Singh also imposed a fine of Rs four lakh on convict H A Siddiqui in the graft case registered against him in 2003 on a complaint by a chartered accountant M M Sachdeva.

"Prosecution (CBI) has been successful in proving that accused H A Siddiqui had demanded bribe of Rs one lakh from R P Katyal through his CA M M Sachdeva who is the complainant in this case.

"...The conversation recorded in office of the accused shows that demand of bribe was made by the accused in clear words and place of acceptance was to be fixed later on as he had taken the mobile phone number of Katyal," the court said.

According to CBI, Sachdeva had filed Katyal's income tax return for 2000-01 and it was selected for scrutiny assessment and a notice in this regard was received by Katyal on October 25, 2002.

Siddiqui started sending summons to them in this regard and called Katyal to pay Rs one lakh bribe, the agency said.

It said a trap team was constituted and it apprehended Siddiqui and one M C Gupta, who was a prosecution witness in the case, at the spot and money was recovered from the polybag carried by Gupta.

CBI had registered the FIR in the case on April 2, 2003, and had filed its chargesheet against Siddiqui in November that year.

During the trial, Siddiqui claimed innocence saying Sachdeva and Gupta, both chartered accountants, had tried to get undue advantage from him and when he refused to do so, they implicated him in a false case.

The court, however, said CBI has proved its case against Siddiqui beyond reasonable doubt.

The court also relied on reports regarding identification of voices saying that it has been proved beyond reasonable doubt that the voice samples were of Siddiqui, Sachdeva and Katyal.

"Report regarding identification of voices in the questioned recording as well as the specimen recording are proved beyond reasonable doubt being of accused (Siddiqui), the complainant and Katyal," it said.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/223733/ex-addil-commissioner-income-tax.html

Senior IAS officer held in Rs 125-cr scam

TNN Feb 2, 2012

KOLKATA: The CID arrested additional secretary Debaditya Chakraborty on Wednesday for his alleged involvement in a 125-crore scam, the first time such a senior IAS officer has been arrested in the state. R M Jamir, a retired IAS officer who was the director of a PSU at the centre of the scam, has also been held.

The arrests were confirmed by DIG, CID (operations) K Jayaraman. The two will be produced in court on Thursday, he said. Several agencies, including the detective department of Kolkata Police, were probing the scam for quite some time but had not received permission to arrest the IAS officer , sources said.

http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-02-02/kolkata/31016809_1_ias-officer-pratap-biswal-bharat-inmate

Excise commissioner held for taking bribe

Express news service : New Delhi, Sat Jan 14 2012

The CBI on Friday arrested Central Excise Commissioner Anup Kumar Srivastava after a local court dismissed his anticipatory bail plea in connection with his alleged role in a graft case. Srivastava was arrested by the agency soon after the private hospital, where he had got himself admitted for treatment, discharged him. According to sources, a team of doctors from AIIMS were supposed to examine him on the court’s orders but the hospital discharged him before this could be done.

The agency, meanwhile, also got three-day custody of Lallan Ojha, excise superintendent and co-accused in the case. Ojha, along with middleman Hemant Gandhi, was arrested by the CBI on January 2.

The top excise officer had sought anticipatory bail after being named as an accused for allegedly receiving a bribe of Rs 60 lakh from two businessmen. It was alleged that the accused persons conducted a fake search of the importer’s office on Srivastava’s instructions.

Swamy gets HC relief against arrest till Jan 30.

Janata Party chief Subramanian Swamy was on Friday granted protection from arrest till January 30 by the Delhi High Court in an FIR lodged against him for writing an alleged inflammatory article.

Justice M L Mehta granted anticipatory bail to Swamy on an undertaking by him that he would not write such articles in the future and issued notice to the Delhi Police for its response on the anticipatory bail plea. While hearing the plea, Justice Mehta observed: “We are a secular country and we should respect the system we have.... It is not a European country. We have a diversity and we should be proud of it. If you (Swamy) give an undertaking that you will not write anything based on the book, I will grant you relief.”

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/excise-commissioner-held-for-taking-bribe/899587/