Corruption Scandal at Northeast Frontier Railway
Guwahati, Feb 7: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has made arrests at Guwahati and Silchar in a bribery case involving a Deputy Chief Engineer, Rampal Dey and a Senior Section Engineer Santosh Kumar of the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) as well as a contractor Sajjan Choudhury from a local private company based in Guwahati. The CBI had previously registered a case against four NFR officials and others, including employees from the private company, for allegedly showing favoritism to the private contractor in awarding contracts, preparing measurement books, processing payment for work in an inflated manner and early release of security deposits and bank guarantees .
The CBI conducted a sting operation to catch Senior Section Engineer, Silchar accepting a bribe of approximately 8 lakh rupees from the private company employee. Searches were conducted at 19 locations in various states including Imphal, Delhi, Bihar and Haryana leading to the recovery of over 1.02 crore rupees. The arrested individuals were brought before the competent court, with the Deputy Chief Engineer and contractor being remanded to 5 days police custody and the SSE being granted a 3-day transit remand.
It should be noted that last month, the CBI arrested an Additional Divisional Railway Manager and six others, including private contractors and hawala operators, in a 50 lakh rupee bribery case.
