Three government officials arrested for accepting bribes

Three government officials including a Block Development officer (BDO) and a village revenue official (talathi) from Raigad district were arrested today in two different raids by the Anti-Corruption Bureau's (ACB) Raigad unit, an ACB official said here, late today evening.
Raigad ACB DYSP Sunil Kalgutkar told PTI that in the first case, the complainant was a petty contractor carrying out small works in the Pen tyaluka of panchayat samitis.
The decision to award contracts rested with BDO Kamlakar Patil, who was approached by the complainant with his proposal seeking work to construct a crematorium at Umbarde village.
On April 17, Patil accepted a bribe of Rs 2,000 from the complainant and demanded an additional Rs 8,000 for the contract to be awarded to him.

Later, Patil offered to give him another contract to beautify Dolari village and demanded Rs 10,000 from him.
However, the complainant lodged a complaint with the Raigad unit of the ACB which and caught Patil accepting Rs 8,000 from the complainant today in his office at Pen Panchayat Samiti, the ACB official said.

Since the complainant had already paid a sum of Rs 2,000 the BDO agreed for an additional sum of Rs 8,000.
In a separate case, a villager who had purchased a land in Bandivili village at Neral approached village revenue official Manisha Hulwale to get his documents updated, when she demanded Rs 5,000 from him.

The villager approached circle officer Prafulla Jadhav who also demanded Rs 50,000 from him.
Since it was more than two months after he had made the application and officials were not responding but demanding bribes, the villager lodged a complained to the Raigad ACB which nabbed both the employees accepting the bribe money.
While village revenue official Manisha Hulwale accepted Rs 5,000, circle officer Prafulla Jadhav accepted a reduced sum of Rs 30,000 which was agreed upon.
Offences under Section 7, Section 13(1)(d) and Section 13(2) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, have been registered at local police stations, the ACB official said.