NEW DELHI, Jan 28: CBI today carried out searches at 35 locations in nine cities including the premises of a former Central Minister, a former High Court judge and an ex-Governor in connection with alleged fraudulent appointments in Bokaro steel plant.
CBI sources said the searches took place after agency registered two separate cases related to alleged irregularities in the appointments in the middle and junior management level in the public sector undertaking in 2008 in which a former Executive Director of the plant and other former senior officers have also been named as accused.
They said the agency has named Junior Managers S M Razi, Rajkumar Jatia and Yogesh Chandra Patnaik. They are relatives of a former Governor, a former Central Minister, who is now a Rajya Sabha candidate, and a former High Court judge respectively as accused in the FIRs.
It is alleged that these candidates were among those favoured in the appointment process.
A Deputy Manager, Ritesh, who was also appointed in a similar fashion, has also been named by CBI in an FIR.
CBI sources alleged that the officials of the steel plant entered in criminal conspiracy in the appointment process by not giving adequate publicity to the appointment advertisement and accepting applications after due dates and in violation of norms by hand or by courier thus favouring these candidates.
The spokesperson said CBI has registered these cases under Indian Penal Code sections of cheating, forgery and relevant provisions of Prevention of Corruption Act.
Some retired officials of the Bokaro Steel plant who held senior positions at the time of appointment, including then Executive Director Jivesh Mishra, are named in an FIR as accused.
“It has been alleged that around 13 candidates were favoured and got selected for the posts of middle and junior management level at Bokaro Steel Plant by adopting fraudulent recruitment and selection process,” CBI spokesperson R K Gaur said in a statement.
The agency carried out searches at 40 locations in nine cities Bokaro, Ranchi, Patna, Arrah (Bihar), Ghaziabad, New Delhi, Bhilai, Bhopal, Jabalpur and Bhubaneshwar including the premises of Jatia, Razi and Patnaik and their parents, the sources said.
The former officials who have been named as accused in the FIR include former General Manager R K Narula, former AGM AS Hebram, former Managing Director V K Srivastava, former DGM A K Mehrotra, former AGM Rajendra Nath Jha, former Chief Project Officer AK Singh. (PTI)
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