Retd Major General, serving Colonel convicted after 22 years

A CBI court today convicted a retired Major General, a serving Colonel and a private firm, after a 22-year long trial of a case, pertaining to the award of supply of tinned meat to Indian Peace Keeping Force of the Army, then deployed in Sri Lanka.
On completion of the trial, Additional Special Judge court for CBI cases K Paramaraj convicted Maj Gen A K Gupta and Lt Col S S Kadian and sentenced them to two years and one-year rigorous imprisonment respectively.
A fine of Rs 1,000 has also been imposed on each of them.
The judge also convicted M/s Coasta & Co represented by Shri Deepak Pereira and imposed a fine of Rs 61,000 on the company.

Based on an allegation, CBI registered a case in 1990 and its investigation revealed that Major General A K Gupta (now retired) of Army supply Corps in Southern Command and Lt Col S S Kadian at Army supply Corps, Margao, conspired to cheat the government over giving orders for supply of tinned meat kheema, abused their official position and favoured M/s Coasta & Co by surpassing the procedure in local purchase scheme, a CBI release said.
False records were created, as if the meat were supplied whereas the actual supply was not made on the dates on which they were shown as received, the release said.

CBI had filed a final report accusing the persons under IPC sections 120 B (punishment for criminal conspiracy), 420 (cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) and sec 5 (2) r/w 5 (1) (d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
During 1987, when IPFK was deployed in Sri Lanka for 'Operation Pawan,' the Southern Head quarters Command had established its maintenance area at Chennai for the logistic support to IPKF sent to Sri Lanka, the release said.