New Delhi: The case of alleged embezzlement at Dehradun airport of over Rs 232 crore by a senior manager of the Airports Authority of India (AAI) has turned murkier as the accused manager has now been booked for orchestrating a similar fraud at his subsequent posting at Jaipur airport.
The amount allegedly embezzled from the Jaipur airport, however, is much less—Rs 18.12 crore—compared to Dehradun.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had arrested the accused Rahul Vijay two weeks back in the Dehradun airport case, and filed a fresh FIR against him Wednesday for alleged fraud at Jaipur airport. The FIR was based on a complaint filed last week by his superior manager at Jaipur airport, where he was posted as a senior manager (finance) till his arrest by the agency.
He was arrested in Jaipur and CBI claimed to have recovered incriminating materials, including documents on immovable properties and valuable securities, during raids at his official and residential premises.
Funds moved from AAI’s bank account to personal ones
In the new complaint to CBI on 11 September, a senior AAI manager alleged that Vijay misappropriated Rs 18.12 crore between October 2024 and February 2025—from the AAI bank account to his two personal bank accounts.
The manager further said that Vijay allegedly acquired admin access to the expenditure bank account of the authority in State Bank of India, and became one of the authorised signatories for transactions from the bank account.
“The amount was transferred by him, since he got control of the bank account. He used to add himself as a beneficiary at the last moment, and just before sending a mandate to the bank for release of payments to the genuine recipients,” the complaint read.
It was further alleged that he transferred money legally to AAI employees, and used the same vouchers or documents to transfer money based on inflated figures to his own bank accounts in SBI and Axis Bank. The SBI bank account has since been closed, the AAI informed the CBI.
“Consequently, an amount of about Rs 18.12 crore through fraudulent entries were charged off under various revenue expenditure heads at different dates during the said period. The AAI in its internal preliminary verification has found the proof of transfer of about Rs 18.12 crore from the AAI account under his control to his personal accounts. There cannot be any justification for an official of AAI to get the money transferred from AAI to his personal accounts,” the manager alleged.
The AAI has also raised apprehensions about involvement of bank officials in the embezzlement case, given the transfer of such a large amount of funds from the official account of AAI to savings accounts of an individual.
ThePrint had previously reported that a similar modus operandi was allegedly adopted by him to siphon off Rs 232 crore from Dehradun airport’s funds.There, an internal inquiry found him to have misused his position and create three user IDs for the AAI’s bank account, which was maintained with SBI. After this, he had begun transferring money from AAI’s bank account to his own, initially with a smaller amount, allegedly to avoid detection.
Vijay had allegedly orchestrated the majority of the embezzlement in September 2021, when he transferred Rs 189 crore into his account by inflating the figure a day after creating tangible assets worth Rs 67.81 crore in the form of the first phase of electrical work for the airport’s new terminal building, according to the AAI.
The next day, he allegedly created 17 additional fictitious assets of Rs 189 crore and got the money transferred into his personal account. Of the Rs 232 crore allegedly siphoned off by him, the AAI claimed that funds worth Rs 43 crore were disbursed under different revenue expenditure heads during his tenure at Dehradun airport.
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)
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