Custom officer gets 3 yrs jail in disproportionate assets case

Special CBI Judge Manoj Jain awarded a three-year jail term to Kulwaran Singh, the then AC of Customs at Inland Container Depot (ICD) New Delhi, a dry port wherein facility to clear goods of imports received in containers by sea is provided, after convicting him under various sections of the Prevention of Corruption (PC) ACt.

Beside Kulwaran, his wife Kulwant Kaur and six associates were sentenced with varying jail term.

"Here, co-accused of Kulwaran have abetted commission of offence. Mere possession per se is not an offence. It becomes an offence when public servant fails to satisfactorily account for such possession. Here also, immediately after Kulwant was found in possession of Rs 15 lakh, a story was manufactured to offer some explanation.

"This was fabricated to put away Kulwaran from clutches of law. An agreement was created to camouflage the ill gotten money and thereby all co-accused have intentionally aided Kulwaran and have abetted the commission of offence," the judge said and also imposed a fine of Rs 1 lakh on Kulwaran.

The Railway Protection Force claimed to have recovered Rs 15 lakh in cash and gold valued at Rs 1.5 lakh from Kulwant when she was travelling to Amritsar by the Shatabdi Express in October 1998.

The CBI said that after being questioned by the Railway police force, Kulawant was not able to give any convincing explanation, so she was arrested and was handed over to them.

It said that Kulwaran and his wife had conspired with Mool Chand and their co-accused to protect Kulwaran from criminal liability. (MORE)