GUWAHATI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has arrested a director of a private company based in Guwahati in connection with a bribery case of Rs one crore allegedly paid to the relative of a Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) of Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR).
“The accused director of the company was absconding since January 17, 2021 and had not cooperated with the investigation. Subsequently, a non-bailable warrant was issued on January 23, 2021 against the said accused by the special judge, CBI Cases, New Delhi. Various places of hiding of the accused in Guwahati, Araria (Bihar), Siliguri, New Delhi etc. were identified, searched and he was apprehended from Delhi,” an official statement said on Friday.
The arrested accused was produced before the designated court in Delhi on Friday.
The CAO of NFR and four others have already been arrested by the investigation agency in connection with the case.
The four other arrested accused in the case (under investigation) related to alleged bribery of Rs one crore include a deputy chief engineer and an assistant executive engineer of NFR, Agartala; an employee of a private company based in Guwahati and a private person (relative of CAO, NFR).
They have already been produced before competent courts.
It may be noted that CBI had registered cases against the arrested accused under relevant sections of IPC and Prevention of Corruption Act.
“It was alleged that the accused were abusing their official positions for obtaining illegal gratification. It was further alleged that the said director of a private company was in contact with said CAO in various on-going projects in the NFR region. It was also alleged that on his demand, the said director, through his employee, delivered a bribe of Rs one crore to the relative (private person) of said CAO at his residence in Dehradun,” a statement issued earlier had said.
It was alleged that some senior public functionaries of NFR were involved in corrupt practices with private contractors for ongoing projects in NFR.
The contractors were allegedly being facilitated in awarding the contracts processing of subsequent bills, release of payments, etc, by the public functionaries in lieu of illegal gratification.
Investigation and searches are on, the statement said.
During earlier searches in as many as 26 locations, including Delhi, Uttarakhand, Assam, Tripura and West Bengal, an amount of Rs 4.43 crore (approximately) was recovered.
“This includes an alleged bribe of Rs one crore, which exchanged hands on January 17, 2021,” the statement added.