PANJIM: Vigilance Department’s Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) has booked 49 cases since April 2012 against corrupt government officials.
Some of them were caught red-handed accepting bribes, while others were booked following corruption complaints.
As per ACB’s official records, a maximum of 6 bribery cases each were booked from Goa Police and Transport departments.
The list follows with Directorate of Municipal Administration (five cases), Directorate of Panchayat (five), Goa Industrial Development Corporation (four), Revenue Department and Housing Board Corporation (two each).
The Anti-Corruption Branch said, “Of 49 cases, two cases have been referred to the court for closure. One case has been chargsheeted in which Mahanand Paryekar (Deputy Ranger of Forest department), Eknath Sairoji (Forester) and Subhash Arundekar (Forest Guard) were accused of demanding and accepting bribe of Rs 10,000.”
The Anti-Corruption Branch has also filed chargesheets in court in four other cases, which were booked prior to 2012. The record reveals that all cases which are chargsheeted by ACB are of same nature, in which officials were booked while accepting bribes.
There are five cases in which more than three government officers have been involved in a single offence, which includes Registrar of Cooperative Societies in which seven were booked for irregularities and manipulations in the recruitment process.
In another offence, 11 officers of Goa Public Service Commission were booked for hatching a criminal conspiracy during a selection process of junior scale officers. For misappropriation of government funds, six were booked from District Rural Development Agency, four were booked from Animal Husbandry for violating the recruitment process whereas another four were booked from Directorate of Municipal Administration for hatching criminal conspiracy in purchase of a defective compactor.
All cases are presently under investigation.
