CBI conducts nationwide searches; registers 67 cases

As part of its anti-corruption drive, the CBI today conducted over 250 nationwide searches on the premises of officials of Income Tax, Doordarshan, CISF and DDA, among others, and registered 67 cases. The searches, conducted by 16 zonal units of the agency, has led to the seizure of over Rs 1 crore in cash, gold biscuits, gold coins and various incriminating documents.

“Eight cases were registered in Special Crimes relating to forged Scheduled Tribes Certificates. Employees of different government departments and PSUs had secured jobs on the basis of these forged certificates,” a CBI spokesperson said.

He said the departments covered during the searches including Income Tax, Doordarshan, Delhi Jal Board, CISF and Oriental Insurance Company. The official said Economic Offences Zone of the agency conducted searches at several places at Delhi, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Bangalore, Nagaland, Uttarakhand in seven separate cases involving data theft, supply of sub-standard quality of dolomite to Bokaro Steel Plant and causing loss of over Rs 1 crore to Punjab National Bank by a Punjab-based firm.

The Anti-Corruption Bureau also conducted searches at 12 places of certain DDA Joint Engineers and Superintending Engineers. The CBI alleged that the engineers had caused undue advantage of more than Rs 1 crore to a contractor and corresponding loss to DDA during 2003-2005 while awarding a contract of earth filling.

Searches at the residences of the officials yielded nearly Rs 10 lakh, 10 gold biscuits and 29 gold coins and 810 gms of gold jewellery.

Four cases were registered in Delhi zone, eight in Lucknow and six in Mumbai zone.

The CBI official said a countrywide campaign will now be launched to elicit detailed information about these cases and seek information for fresh ones.