Almost a year after the railway bribery case came to light, former Railway Minister Pawan Bansal's nephew Vijay Singla was on Tuesday put on trial by a Delhi court along with nine others in the case for criminal conspiracy and corrupt activities centered around securing a plum post for a Railway board member (staff) co-accused Mahesh Kumar.
Special CBI Judge Swarna Kanta Sharma charged Mr. Singla and others under section 120-B IPC (criminal conspiracy) and five sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act relating to demand and acceptance of bribe and misuse of public office.
Besides Mr. Singla and Mr. Kumar, those who have been charged are Managing Director of Bangalore-based G.G. Tronics India Pvt Limited N.R. Manjunath, middlemen Ajay Garg and Sandeep Goyal, Rahul Yadav, Sameer Sandhir, Sushil Daga, C.V. Venugopal and M.V. Murali Krishan.
“...All of you had committed offence under section 120B IPC (criminal conspiracy), read with section 7 (public servant taking gratification), 9, 12, 13(2) read with 13 (1)(d) PC Act (criminal misconduct by a public servant) and within my cognizance. I hereby direct that all of you be tried on the aforesaid charges by this court,” the court said.
All the accused pleaded not guilty before the court and claimed trial, which is to begin on August 25.
The court has summoned the then Railway Board chairman Vijay Mittal, who is now a senior officer in UPSC, to testify as prosecution witness and also Jagmohan Singh Rawat, the sanctioning authority for the same day.
The former Railway Minister and Congress leader Pawan Bansal, who had to resign from his office in the wake of the bribery case, is also one of the nearly 90 prosecution witnesses in the case.
The court had on Monday rejected the plea of an NGO to make Bansal an accused in the Rs 10 crore bribery case.
In her order on charge against Singla, the court noted: “During period between January 2013 to May 5, 2013 you accepted illegal gratification of Rs 89.68 lakh from your co-accused Mahesh Kumar, Manjunath, Yadav, Sameer, Sushil, Venugopal and Murali Krishan for yourself or for any other person as a motive or reward for inducing by the exercise of your personal influence on any public servant for appointing your co-accused Mahesh Kumar as a Member (Electrical) in Railway Board and was caught on the spot at Chandigarh while accepting the bribe amount in his office premises and thereby you committed offence under section 9 of PC Act (taking gratification for exercise of personal influence).”
The court noted in its orders that Mahesh Kumar had paid the bribe to Singla to get his desired appointment as Member Electrical and the bribe money to be delivered at Singla's Chandigarh office was arranged through other accused persons who were assured favours in the event of his becoming member electrical.
The Special Judge noted that accused Rahul was actively involved in arranging money, vehicles, drivers for delivery of bribe amount at Chandigarh on May 3, 2013 and withdrew Rs 10 lakh from account of Venkateshwara Rail Nirman Pvt Ltd so as to contribute it towards delivery of bribe money to Mr. Singla.
Accused Mr. Venugopal was the director of Venkateshwara Rail Pvt Ltd and the court held “he had complete knowledge about the conspiracy and was involved in arrangement of money to be paid as illegal gratification.”
Accused Mr. Sameer arranged Rs 50 lakh on direction of Mr. Manjunath. Accused Murali Krishan, the court said, contributed Rs 25 lakh for Mahesh Kumar's desired appointment as Member (Electrical) knowing fully well the illegal purpose of money collection.
