Civic officials convicted in CWG street-light case

A court here on Monday convicted four municipal officials, a private company and its two officials in the Commonwealth Games street-lights case.

Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) Special Judge Brijesh Garg convicted the four officials of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) -- then superintending engineer D.K. Sugan, then executive engineer O.P. Mahala, then accountant Raju V. and then tender clerk Gurcharan Singh.

The court also held guilty Sweka Power Tech Engineers Pvt. Ltd. and its director J.P. Singh and managing director T.P. Singh.

All the convicts were taken into custody, a CBI spokesperson said.

The court fixed September 1 for pronouncement on the quantum of sentence.

According to the CBI charge sheet filed on July 28, 2011, the accused entered into a criminal conspiracy for upgrading street lights in view of the Commonwealth Games in October 2010 and awarded it to a private firm by manipulating tender documents.

This caused undue pecuniary loss of Rs.3.62 crore to the government, it said.

The CBI also charge-sheeted Mehul Karnik, an employee of Philips India Pvt. Ltd. as an accused in the case, but he was later discharged.

The CBI registered a case on charges of cheating, criminal conspiracy and other related charges under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.