CBI FIRs NR and NER officials for corruption in Gati Shakti project

NEW DELHI : The CBI has registered an FIR against senior officials of Northern Railways (NR) and North Eastern Railway (NER) posted in Lucknow and Varanasi for allowing the unhindered passage of irregular bills from a PM Gati Shakti project contractor in exchange for bribes, officials said on Tuesday.

The central probe agency has cited instances of alleged corruption in the Lucknow and Varanasi offices of the Railways in the centre’s flagship project, Gati Shakti, in Bhadohi, granted to Praveen Kumar Singh of Tangent Infratech Pvt Limited and Sikander Ali, they said.

The project was conducted under the supervision of Vivek Kushwaha, Deputy Chief Engineer of Gati Shakti, who is posted in Northern Railways, Lucknow.

The CBI has alleged that Kushwaha approved inflated bills in exchange for bribes, to profit the private contractor and himself.

Besides Kushwaha and Singh, the CBI has also booked the New Delhi-based company Tangent Infratech Pvt Limited and an employee, Jimmy Singh, who was allegedly involved in one of the multiple bribe transactions listed by the CBI in its FIR.

The probe agency has named several officers of NER, including Senior Divisional Engineer Rakesh Ranjan, Office Superintendent in the DRM office, Manish, Senior Section Engineer (Works) Abhishek Gupta, Accounts Section Head Yogesh Gupta, and Senior Clerk in the office of Assistant Engineer, Sushil Kumar Rai.

The CBI FIR registered on ”source information” outlines a pattern of corruption in the two railway departments. The agency has flagged a bribe payment of Rs 2 lakh to Ranjan in June this year, which was delivered by Jimmy Singh, Rs 50,000 to Gupta in April, routine payments to Manish, Gupta and Rai, the senior clerk for expediting the passing of bills.

Source : PTI