351 govt employees caught taking bribe in 2020: ACB

JAIPUR: A total of 351 government employees of Rajasthan were caught taking bribe by the anti-corruption bureau (ACB) in 2020, said BL Soni, directorgeneral of the anti-graft body.

The employees included an Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officer, three Rajasthan Administrative Services (RAS) officers and four of the Rajasthan Police Service.

Sharing the yearly performance of the anti-graft body, Soni said 60 cases were registered last year against officials, including six gazetted ones, under relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption (PC) Act.

“Irrespective of the fact that the state was under complete lockdown for three months, the number of trap cases increased in 2020 compared to last year,” he said.

According to ACB data, 248 corrupt officers were trapped in 2018; the number rose to 309 in 2019 and to 351 in 2020. However, misuse of office cases went down from 88 to 34.

“In 56 cases, 71 accused were sentenced by courts under the Prevention of Corruption Act; 61 of them are public servants and 10 private persons. The public servants included 6 gazetted officers and 55 non-gazetted employees. The overall conviction rate is 52.83%,” said Soni.

The DG said that in the beginning of last year more than two dozen officials of the transport department were part of an extortion racket that was busted by ACB.

MDS university vice chancellor and his middlemen were nabbed by ACB for demanding money in the name of college affiliation, increasing exam seats and allotting exam centres.

“Recently, for the first time Baran district collector Indra Singh was arrested after his personal assistant (PA) Mahaveer Singh Nagar was allegedly caught red-handed accepting a bribe of ₹1.40 lakh on Singh’s behalf,” said Soni.

ADG, ACB, Dinesh MN said, “We request people to come to us against this serious problem of corruption and do not spend the hard-earned money in bribes.

“If a state government or central government worker or officer demands bribe from anyone, then they can complain on 1064 helpline or send a complaint by text message, audio or video message, or online. On your complaint, the bureau will contact you immediately, verify and take action against the corrupt officer and will fully cooperate in completing your legitimate work,” said Dinesh MN.

He added that the identity of the complainant will be kept confidential if he wishes. “ACB will fully cooperate in getting your legitimate work done by apprehending corrupt workers. The state government has given clear instructions to all departments to cooperate on this subject.”