New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation is probing P. Chidambaram, Lalu Yadav, Bhupinder Hooda and the Rs 1.86 lakh crore coal scam. It has more than 1,200 pending cases and 1,029 vacancies. Yet, the CBI is busy chasing a case involving two postal department officials from Uttar Pradesh for allegedly demanding Rs 100 as bribe.
On 30 November, the agency registered a case against Suraj Mishra and Santosh Kumar Saroj of the postal department in Pratapgarh and arrested them for allegedly demanding a bribe of Rs 100.
According to the FIR, Mishra and Saroj allegedly demanded a bribe of Rs 100 from Subha Singh, a commissioning agent of the postal department, on deposit of every Rs 20,000. The complaint was made by Subha’s husband, Prabhat Kumar Singh.
Speaking to ThePrint over the phone from Kunda, Singh said his wife Subha works as a commission agent with the postal office and her job is to encourage people to deposit their savings in the post office. For every Rs 20,000 deposit, she gets a commission of 4 per cent.
On 25 November, however, when she went to the postal department to deposit the cash collected, Subha was allegedly asked by Mishra and Saroj to give them Rs 100 for every Rs 20,000 that she deposited.
“When we deposit the cash with the postal department, our commission is generated online and directly transferred to our bank account. But this time, the two officials of the postal department refused to clear our payment until we agreed to pay Rs 100 for every Rs 20,000,” Singh alleged.
“Why should I pay Rs 100 extra? They told us that if we refuse to pay the bribe, they will not release the commission payment from their end.”
According to Singh’s complaint, on 25 November, he went to deposit Rs 99,400 in the postal office on behalf of his wife. The next day, he deposited another Rs 59,920 and the following day, he deposited Rs 60,000.
Singh alleged that on 25 and 26 November he was asked to give Rs 500 and Rs 300 as “service fee/bribe”.
“When I asked what that was for, they (Mishra and Saroj) said they have charged Rs 100 for every Rs 20,000 we deposited as bribe,” Singh alleged.
He claimed that he requested the two officials to “waive off” the bribe.
“I requested them to deposit the money and release the commission without taking Rs 100. They then agreed to deposit the money but with a warning. They told me that they would not make any further deposits or release the commission, if I do not pay them Rs 100,” Singh claimed.
“They also threatened that they would not let me work in the field if I refuse to pay the bribe per transaction. This is when I decided to make a complaint,” he added.
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‘A bigger racket’
The CBI, however, has said that it is not just a case of two officials asking for Rs 100 bribe but a larger racket which they will now investigate.
“The CBI intervened after we found that not just one but many poor villagers were being forced to pay a bribe to deposit their money. It is not a one-off case but a larger racket,” said CBI spokesperson Nitin Wakankar.
“This modus operandi was affecting several villages in the area. We intervened when we found out that the villagers needed help,” he added.
But the CBI is yet to initiate a larger inquiry into the matter and has only registered a single case based on Singh’s complaint against the two postal officials.
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CBI’s latest catch — 2 UP govt officials who ‘demanded Rs 100 bribe’. Why not? The big fish, all of them, left the country.