CBI arrests ex-orissa HC judge, five others
NEWDELHI: More trouble is in store for former Orissa high court judge IM Quddusi and his alleged associate Bhawana Pandey, arrested by the CBI in connection with a medical admission scam.
The agency has decided to expand its probe against the duo to see if they were involved in other similar cases of corruption.
“During searches at residence of Quddusi and Pandey, CBI sleuth found some documents which indicate they may be involved in other instances of ‘settling’ matters. It seems they were active in other government departments too,” said a source. Quddusi was a judge of Odisha HC between 2004 and 2010.
According to a CBI FIR, Quddusi and Pandey assured representatives of Prasad Education Trust, which runs Lucknowbased Prasad Institute of Medical Sciences, that they would get their “matter settled” in the SC using their contacts. The Lucknow-based medical institute is among 46 colleges barred by the government from admitting students for the next few years due to “sub-standard facilities and nonfulfilment of required criteria”.
Accordingly, the duo got in touch with one Biswanath Agrawala from Bhubaneswar, who claimed to be in close contact with senior relevant public functionaries. Besides Quddusi and Pandey, four more accused were arrested by the CBI — Agrawala, two representatives of the trust, BP Yadav and Palash Yadav, and an alleged hawala dealer named Ramdev Saraswat.
The CBI also recovered ₹1 crore from Agrawala, soon after he got the money from the alleged hawala dealer in Chandni Chownk area of the city.
SC on August 1 this year gave a combined order on the petitions of Prasad institute and other such petitioners, asking the government to take a fresh look into the cases. Following the directive, the government gave a hearing and decided on August 10 to debar it from admitting fresh students for 2017-18 and 2018-19. It also asked Medical Council of India to encash its bank guarantee of ₹2 crore. According to the CBI FIR, after the government’s decision, BP Yadav got in touch with Quddusi and Pandey and “entered into a criminal conspiracy to get the matter settled”.