Tag: CBI

‘No proof of girls being killed inside Bihar home’.

Source – indiatoday.in

More than a year after two skeletons were recovered from a shelter home for girls in Bihar’s Muzaffarpur, amidst allegations of several of the inmates being sexually assaulted, drugged and some disposed of, the CBI has on Wednesday said that the remains were not of the inmates.

Girls recovered from the shelter home had given statements to counsellors from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences that they believed that some girls had been killed and buried in the shelter home campus.

The CBI in an earlier status report to the court had said that the names of the allegedly missing girls were being verified, as about 35 girls had similar names. On Wednesday, Attorney-General KK Venugopal informed the bench headed by CJI SA Bobde that the CBI had traced all the inmates who had been sent to the shelter home and none of them were dead.

The A-G also informed the bench that the skeletons could not have been those of the girls sent to the shelter home, as one was found to be of an adult male, while the other was of an adult female.

The probe is underway, said the A-G. The apex court had transferred the trial of the sexual assault and drugging case to Delhi, where the special court is scheduled to pronounce its verdict against Bihar strongman Brajesh Thakur and 20 others, including the government officials of the social welfare department and the Child Welfare Committee’s members.

The A-G said the testimony given by the girls was due to the traumatised condition of the victims, who had been repeatedly drugged, sexually assaulted and physically beaten by the shelter home staff and others. There is no evidence of any murder of any of the inmates. The children were under tremendous trauma. The NIMHANS teams have counselled and spoken to the children and found that there was no murder, said the A-G. The apex court has taken note of the submissions made by the CBI and will hear the matter after two weeks.

70 Officers May Face Action For Lapses In Running Bihar Shelter Homes.

Source – ndtv.com

Patna: Twenty-five Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officers are among over 70 officials in Bihar who could face action for lapses in managing shelter homes in the state that was shook by sexual exploitation of over 40 girls at such facilities in 2018.

The lapses tumbled out one after another during a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) as it dug deep into the case for one-and-a-half years, officials said. The CBI has asked the Bihar government to act against the officials and has also informed the Supreme Court, officials said.

The CBI in an affidavit to the Supreme Court said it has completed investigation into all the 17 cases liked to the Muzaffarpur shelter home rape cases.

Young girls were forced to dance to vulgar songs, sedated and raped at a government-run shelter in Bihar’s Muzaffarpur in a massive sex scandal with links to influential politicians and bureaucrats. A human skeleton – believed to be the remains of one of the victims – was found in October 2018 at a cremation ground in the district’s Sikandarpur area.

More grisly details are found in the chargesheet filed by the CBI against the main accused, the politically well-connected Brajesh Thakur, who operated the shelter for several years.

“We have got the report. We will take action under the law. The Nitish Kumar government does not falsely implicate or free anyone,” Bihar Social Welfare Minister Krishnanandan Verma told NDTV.

Nivedita Jha, the petitioner in the case, said the findings of the CBI so far are “prima facie”. “It is said the criminal act part of the case is yet to be proved. I feel they need to investigate this care more thoroughly,” Ms Jha told NDTV.

The state government, however, is yet to decide on what kind of action it should take against the 25 IAS and 45 state civil service officers. Sources said in most of the cases, the officers could be let off with a warning or one or two increments in their salaries could be blocked.

Lok Sabha question: Uttar Pradesh tops chart in PDS corruption, Bihar 2nd, Delhi 3rd.

Source – cnbctv18.com

As many as 807 complaints of corruption in the public distribution system (PDS) were received across the country till October 31, 2019, of which Uttar Pradesh reported maximum number of complaints, Union Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Raosaheb Danve-Patil has said.

In a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha on Tuesday, the Union Minister said that UP has topped the list in PDS corruption cases with 328 complaints, while Bihar comes next with 108 complaints.

Significantly, UP has hit the headlines many times earlier for PDS scams. In 2014, a Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court directed the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to investigate the land of the then cabinet minister of the state, Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiya, in a multi-crore food grains scam in the state.

Ravi Kishan, MP from Gorakhpur and Dr Ramshankar Katheria, MP from Agra sought details of these complaints as well as the steps taken to curb it.

Delhi ranks third in corruption cases in PDS with 78 complaints been received. Whereas West Bengal has received 48 complaints in such cases.

However, the states from which no complaints have been received include Manipur, Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Sikkim. Apart from this, no complaints have also been received from the Union Territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Chandigarh, Dadar Nagar Haveli and Lakshadweep.

The minister said that for the offence of violation of the provisions of the PDS (Control) Order 2015, there is a provision of punitive action under the Essential Commodities Act 1955. Under this order, the state and union territory have the power to take punitive action.

At the same time, to make the system more transparent under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) 2013, an institutional arrangement for monitoring it has been done by vigilance committee, District Grievance Redressal Officers, State Food Commission.The minister said that to improve the public distribution system, the ministry is computerising the PDS operation in collaboration with all states and union territories. Under this scheme, supply-chain management is being computerised by digitising ration cards/beneficiaries and efforts are being made to bring transparency in it, besides, the ration shops will be automated using electronic point of sale (e-POS) devices.

How Bihar PSC cleaned its act: Codes, late choices.

Source – indianexpress.com

Long wrestling with allegations of corruption and nepotism, the Bihar Public Service Commission (BPSC) has introduced radical reforms over the past 18 months, the most important of them concealing the identity of a candidate through a code system. Public Service Commissions of at least seven states have approached the BPSC seeking to replicate the system, while others have expressed interest.

Recently, the BPSC held prelims for its 65th combined services exam for 2019 vacancies, thus putting on track a schedule that had been running behind by years.

Under the new system, each candidate is allotted a code, which is then placed on his/her answersheet instead of the roll number. The evaluation is done under CCTV surveillance, and an examiner cannot leave the premises till checking for the day is done. Even the BPSC Chairman and the Controller of Examination do not know the questions, and the former randomly selects a question set from among seven sets.

The interviewers too receive only the code number of a candidate, with no details of his or her name and family details, nor are they allowed to ask any questions regarding this. The composition of the interview panel is decided just half an hour before an interview.

The BPSC, like the UPSC (Union Public Service Commission), now includes former diplomats, retired bureaucrats, and ex-IPS officers, including generals, CBI, CRPF and IB, RAW directors, as members. Its seven members, including the chairman, are selected by the Governor in consultation with state government. In the existing body, three members retired recently.

BPSC Chairman Shishir Sinha said, “The commission had been witness to several protests and litigations. We needed a completely transparent system.”

In 2009, the Patna High Court ordered had rescheduling of the BPSC’s 52nd prelims exam following a plea alleging anomalies. Earlier, in 2005, former BPSC chairman Ramsinghasan Singh and eight others had been arrested on the allegation that 184 candidates had been elevated to the Bihar Administrative Services.

Haryana and Odisha are among seven states which are keen to replicate the BPSC reforms, and chairmen of their PSCs recently visited Bihar. Earlier, a former chairman of the Uttar Pradesh Service Commission had visited the BPSC.

Sinha said their first challenge was to regularise examinations, using the same workforce and resources. Between April 2018 and October 2019, the BPSC released pending results of its 56th to 59th combined services examinations, while simultaneously conducting examinations for 60th to 62nd lists and releasing the final results. Last week, it announced the final results of its 63rd examination, with a Madhya Pradesh resident emerging as the topper. The written test for the 64th exam has been conducted and the interview would be held in the coming two months, while the BPSC just held the prelims for the 65th exam.

“Earlier, the chairman decided the members of an interview panel. We introduced a software with names of the experts, and while we call all of them an hour before the interview, the names for the panel are picked by the software with half an hour to go. The panel gets a sealed envelope with codes of 10 candidates. This ensures that till the last moment, neither candidates nor panelists nor any other staff of the commission knows who is interviewing whom,” Sinha said, adding, “The printer alone knows the questions selected, and can be held responsible for a leak.”

The BPSC’s evaluation rooms and its entrance are monitored by 30-plus CCTV cameras, while the strongroom holding the answer sheets is now just next door, to minimise human involvement in transfer of papers. The rooms are being further fortified.

As it places its house in order, the BPSC has seen a change in the profile of applicants, with many of them graduates from IITs, NITs and BITS-Pilani, the BPSC said. Administrative services are now the first preference against police services earlier. Over 20,000 applicants were from Delhi alone for the 65th prelims.

Admitting that they faced initial resistance from within, but “zero interference”, the Chairman said, “Why should interviewers know a candidate’s surname and family details? This has got us praise from the UPSC.”

BPSC Secretary Keshav Ranjan Prasad recounted his own experience, saying while he gave the prelims in 1984, he got a job only four years later. “I can understand the pain and frustration of a candidate through the prolonged process. We are aiming at completing the entire process in a year. We are pretty close to doing so.”

In the last fully completed exam (the 63rd), 90,697 candidates appeared for the prelims, 4,277 cleared the exam, 4,161 gave the written test, 924 appeared for the interview, and 355 got through. This process was completed in 15 months.

Jharkhand lynching case: Murder charge reimposed against 11 accused of killing Tabrez Ansari

Source: hindustantimes.com

The Jharkhand police on Wednesday reimposed section 302 of the Indian Penal Code ( murder) in a supplementary charge sheet filed against 11 accused in a case involving the mob lynching of 24-year-old Tabrez Ansari in Dhatkidih village under Seraikela police station (PS) on the night of June 17-18 this year, district police officials said.

Police also pressed the same charge against two others accused in the case.

The police dropped the charge of murder in the first charge sheet submitted in the Seraikela court on July 23 and charged the 11 jailed accused under section 304 of the IPC (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) citing the autopsy report and viscera report that mentioned cardiac arrest as the cause of Ansari’s death on June 22.

Ansari died during treatment at Seraikela Sadar Hospital, four days after he was brutally beaten up by an angry mob for allegedly trying to burgle the house of Kamal Mahato in Dhatkidih village during the intervening night of June 17 and 18. He was handed over to the police by villagers on June 18 and sent to jail the same day. His thrashing was captured on a video.

The absence of the murder charge in the original charge sheet prompted outrage; the police were already under fire for not admitting a clearly injured Ansari in hospital soon after it apprehended him.

“Seraikela police submitted a supplementary charge sheet in Setaikela court today under section 302 of the IPC after ongoing investigation against two more accused was completed. Since the second autopsy report has further elaborated and pinpointed cause of death and the forensic report has also confirmed the integrity of the lynching video, section 302 of IPC has also been re-imposed against all the 11 jailed accused,” said Navin Kumar, South Chotanagpur inspector general of police (IGP).

Kolhan DIG Kuldeep Dwivedi in a statement on Wednesday said that viscera report from forensic science laboratory (FSL), Chandigarh, attributed Ansari’s death to cardiac arrest but added that it did not pinpoint the exact cause of death.

The police got another an autopsy test done by a board of doctors of the Mahatma Gandhi Memorial Medical College Hospital (MGMMCH) in Jamshedpur, he added.

This showed that the cardiac arrest was caused by heart chambers filling with blood as a result of the beating he received, he explained in the statement. “The forensic report of the lynching video also confirmed its integrity and stated that no tampering was done with the video, therefore, section 302 is being imposed against all the 13 accused.”

Ansari’s widow Sahista Parveen expressed her happiness that the murder charge has been reimposed against all the accused but sought a CBI investigation into the case.

“This is victory of our fight for justice. Imposing section 302 sure has sparked hope for justice but I still demand a CBI probe so that the culprits can’t escape by any chance. I want all of them to be hanged to death,” Parveen said.

IRS officer had fudged age, got new identity to appear for UPSC’s IAS exam: CBI

Source: hindustantimes.com

The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered a case against an Indian Revenue Service Officer who cleared the Union Public Service Commission more than a decade ago. The CBI says the Bihar man, was overage to apply for the UPSC’s 2007 civil services examination, commonly known as IAS exam, and got himself a new identity to beat the system.

He seemed to have succeeded for little over a decade. He cleared the exam, was allocated the Indian Revenue Service (Customs and Central Excise) and was at last count, posted at the GST office in Kolkata. Then, someone complained.

In a First Information Report registered by the CBI this week, the agency said the IRS officer was known by a different name for a larger part of his childhood and youth in Bihar’s West Champaran district.

But when he changed his name, the Bihar man did not bother to change his father’s name or his address. The CBI says that it had come across documents which indicate that he had done his schooling from the Jawahar Navodya Vidyalaya at Bettiah.

The FIR has also alleged manipulation of documents, pointing that the officer got into the civil services in response to a public notice for examination in 2006. But the graduation degree that he was in his personal file indicates he got his BA (Hons) degree two years later.

“It is clear from the above that he had done some manipulation to appear at the exam,” the CBI FIR said.

Indicating that he had help from someone within the examination system, the FIR said it also transpired that the IRS officer hadn’t submitted any date of birth certificate or the certificate of clearing the class 12 exam in 2003.

The CBI also underscored that the Bihar School Education Committee hadn’t cooperated in providing his details.

JPSC aims to wrap up evaluation by October

Source: dailypioneer.com

The Jharkhand Public Service Commission (JPSC) has set a target of completing the ongoing evaluation process for the 6th JPSC Combined Civil Services mains examination by the end of October this year, officials from the commission said on Tuesday. However, the results will be declared only after Jharkhand High Court gives its go-ahead to the commission, they added.

“Since the number of aspirants is very high, we have set a target of completing the evaluation by the end of October. Once the evaluation is over, we will seek permission from the High Court for declaration of the results,” said Sudhir Tripathi, Chairperson of JPSC.

On the day the mains exam started, a court of Chief Justice Aniruddha Bose and Justice Anubha Rawat Choudhary ordered that the results of JPSC Mains should not be declared without the court’s permission.

The prelims test for JPSC 6 was conducted way back on December 18, 2016 and its result was declared in February 2017. Initially, the commission declared 5,400 candidates successful; however, months later it revised the results and declared 6100 candidates successful. The mains test, supposed to be conducted on January 29, 2018, had to be postponed by a year after some candidates approached the High Court with a plea citing incompliance of the reservation roaster in the prelims test.

Taking cognizance of the plea, the State Government constituted a committee headed by state revenue and land reforms minister Amar Bauri to look into the matter. In August last year the JPSC again issued fresh results declaring 34,634 candidates eligible for the Mains examination.

The number of candidates who cleared the Prelims was about 106 times the available 326 vacancies and that became the bone of contention. Aspirants alleged that as per rules, the number of successful candidates in Prelims should not exceed 15 times the total number of available vacancies.

Around 17,000 aspirants appeared for the JPSC mains exam. The evaluation of papers is being conducted under strict security and many JPSC officials too are not allowed to enter the evaluation cell of JPSC, an official said. He added that the JPSC had written to at least 62 universities seeking evaluators for the process. The evaluation process began in the month of June.

The Mains paper consisted of 1050 marks with 100 marks compulsory (Hindi/English), 150 marks papers on regional languages, and four papers each consisting of 200 marks.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court on Monday ordered reevaluation of papers for JPSC 1 and JPSC 2. The apex court gave a time of four months to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for completing their probe into the matter.

Jharkhand HC bench recuses from hearing CBI plea in case involving Lalu Prasad

Source: .moneycontrol.com

A Jharkhand High Court bench recused itself from hearing a petition filed by the CBI seeking enhancement of the jail term of RJD chief Lalu Prasad and five others in a fodder scam case.

When the petition came up for hearing, Justice K P Dev said that since he had been a counsel for the CBI earlier, he wished to stay away from hearing the matter.

The bench of Justice Apresh Kumar Singh and Justice K P Dev then directed that the petition be sent to another bench.

A special CBI court had sentenced Prasad and five others to three-and-a-half years prison term while sentencing another convict to seven years of incarceration in the same case.

The CBI moved the high court seeking enhancement of the jail term of Prasad and five others, contending that the case pertained to conspiracy and the sentence should be the same – seven years – for all.Prasad has been serving jail term in a number of fodder scam cases in Ranchi.

110 raids, 19 states, 30 FIRs: CBI’s nationwide crackdown against corruption, arms smuggling

Source: indiatoday.in

In a nationwide crackdown, the Central Bureau of Investigation on Tuesday conducted searches at around 110 places in 19 states and Union Territories.

Sources have told India Today TV that CBI has registered around 30 new separate cases relating to corruption, criminal misconduct, arms smuggling and others.

This comes after the July 2 crackdown by CBI against bank fraud cases where the agency had conducted raids at over 50 locations in 50 cities across 12 states and Union Territories.

According to CBI, the raids were conducted in Delhi, Mumbai, Ludhiana, Thane, Valsad, Pune, Palani, Gaya, Gurgaon, Chandigarh, Bhopal, Surat, Kolar and many other cities. The fraud amount in the 16 cases are over Rs 1100 crore which may rise during the investigation.

The newly registered 30 FIR’s have been lodged against the accused including various companies, firms, their promoters, directors, bank officials and private persons.

India Today TV has learnt that few of the raids are being conducted in Mumbai, Delhi, NCR, Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.

Sources say that the government’s major agenda during the election was corruption cases in light of Rs 13,000 crore bank fraud by Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi.

Tabrez lynching: Police issue alert on fake posts

Source: hindustantimes.com

A joint group of organisations, which took out a protest rally on Friday in the state capital against the recent mob lynching of a community’s youth in Saraikela, attacked and vandalised a bus of Central Institute of Psychiatry (CIP) at Rajendra Chowk panicking the commuters.

The district and police administration, however, intervened soon and brought the situation under control. Police personnel have been deployed in area.

“It was a minor incident. Situation was soon brought under control,” said Ranchi deputy commissioner Rai Mahimapat Roy. According to eyewitnesses, students sitting in the bus raised religious slogan which incited people participating in the rally. They then attacked the bus and resorted to vandalism. Some students received minor injuries.

Earlier in the day, organisations under the banner of Muttahida Muslim Mahaz (MMM) convened a public meeting at Urs ground at Doranda where leaders vented ire over the rising mob lynching incidents in the state and demanded CBI probe into the recent killing of Tabrez Ansari.

Addressing the gathering MMM convenor Maulana Obedulla Kasmi said that their agitation was not directed against a particular caste or religion but it was against the unscrupulous elements, who are trying to spread hatred by committing crimes like mob lynching.

The organisations prepared a charter of seven demands to press it before the government.

A mob had mercilessly beaten up Ansari for hours and forced him to chant Jai Sri Ram and Jai Hanuman in Dhatkidih village under Seraikela police station (PS) in the night of June 17-18. He succumbed to his injuries on June 22.