Nagpur: A Super Class I Officer with Central Railway’s Nagpur Division was caught red-handed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Monday while accepting a bribe. The sleuths of Anti-Corruption Unit of CBI zeroed on Akhilesh Choubey, Senior Divisional Mechanical Engineer (Sr DME), after he allegedly accepted cash of Rs. 10,000/- from a contractor against clearing of bills for deployment of vehicles, said CBI officials. As per the practice, immediately after the trap, separate teams raided Choubey’s official residence in Civil Lines area and also the house at his native place in Betul, Madhya Pradesh. Substantial documents were seized by the CBI officials during the searches at the office and at the home.
Simultaneously, CBI has also contacted banks and directed freezing of accounts in the name of Choubey and his family members. According to CBI, the complainant has provided four wheelers to Nagpur Division on rent. His vehicles are being used at Nagpur Railway Station and Divisional Railway Manager’s office. As the bills for the last seven months were due with the division, the complainant approached Choubey for approval of the bills, informed CBI officials. Senior DME is the authority for contract about deployment of vehicles over Nagpur Division and the bills run into lakhs of rupees. As per the complaint made to CBI, Choubey had allegedly demanded Rs 10,000 bribe for clearing the pending bill. Fed-up with delay in getting the payment, the contractor approached CBI Nagpur and lodged a complaint. Acting on the complaint, CBI officials first verified the demand and thereafter laid a trap. Choubey was arrested in his office while accepting the bribe at 2.30 pm, the CBI officials said.
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The information about the trap spread among the railway officials in the evening only. The CBI team was in Senior DME’s chamber for completing the formalities till evening and then he was formally taken into custody. His face as per sources was covered with black cloth when CBI team escorted Choubey from office to their official vehicle. The searches were going on till late in the night.An offence under provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act was registered against Choubey. He will be produced in court on Tuesday.
CBI’s second big catch in DRM office This is the second instance at DRM office wherein a senior ranking officer was netted by CBI. Previously, Senior Divisional Engineer (Co-ord), the head of Engineering Branch, was caught in his chamber on the first floor of DRM office after accepting bribes from a kin of local politician. Apart from that, two clerks in the Engineering Branch were also nabbed by CBI a few years back and long back a supervisor was netted in connection with bribes.
