Bribery in Railways: CBI raids in five cities including Patna, 5 arrested including three officers. 46 lakh seized The CBI has busted a bribery racket in the East Central Railway by conducting raids in Patna, Kolkata, Hajipur, Samastipur and Sonepur. CBI has arrested five people including three senior railway officers.
The CBI has arrested five people, including three senior officials of East Central Railway (ECR), in a bribery case. Apart from the railway officials, two other people from a Kolkata-based private company have also been arrested. The arrested railway officials include East Central Railway Chief Freight Transport Manager (CFTM) Sanjay Kumar, Samastipur Senior Divisional Operations Manager (DOM) Rupesh Kumar and Sonpur Senior Divisional Operations Manager Sachin Mishra. All three are officers of the Indian Railway Traffic Service (IRTS). Naval Ladha and Manoj Kumar Saha of Kolkata-based Abha Agro Industries Pvt Ltd and Abha Agro Exports Pvt Ltd have also been arrested. 46.50 lakh rupees have also been recovered during the raids. Apart from them, Manoj Ladha, associated with the company, has also been named in the bribery case. The CBI conducted raids in Patna, Sonepur, Hajipur, Samastipur and Kolkata.
According to the CBI, these officers of East Central Railway are accused of providing racks for the required loading of goods to the shopkeepers under the zone. A deliberate conspiracy was hatched between the directors of the Calcutta company and the railway authorities. All rules and regulations were kept in cold storage in supplying racks to the said private company. In return, the company paid huge bribes to the railway authorities every month. An FIR was filed on Sunday in the case, in which Sanjay Kumar, Rupesh Kumar and Sachin Mishra, besides the directors of the Kolkata-based company, were accused by three named and unidentified persons.
According to the CBI, CFTM Sanjay Kumar was arrested while accepting a bribe of Rs 6 lakh. Meanwhile, the bribe giver was also caught. It is being told that the director of the Kolkata-based company asked his brother to send a bribe of Rs 23.5 lakh to the railway authorities. After the arrest, the CBI raided a total of 16 locations in Patna, Sonepur, Hajipur, Samastipur and Kolkata. During this time, several documents worth Rs.46.50 lakh were also recovered. Of this, Rs 29 lakh was seized from a businessman in Kolkata. Money was also kept in 6 envelopes for bribing railway officials in the SUV.
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Many more officers may come in JD.
According to sources, after the arrest of three senior officers of East Central Railway and the revelation of irregularities in the allotment of rakes, many other officers are also feared to be involved. During the raid, an envelope containing bribes to six railway officials was recovered from the XUV car. It is hoped that many more arrests may be made in this case soon.
