Police on Tuesday arrested a clerk in the Joint Transport Commissioner's office in Khairatabad ‘for his complicity' in the recently unearthed autorickshaw registration scam in Trimulgherry Road Transport Authority office.
The senior assistant, P. Raghavender, 30, arrested by the Central Crime Station, was the second person to land behind the bars in the scam. Already, an autorickshaw driver turned RTA agent, A. Raji Reddy, was held for allegedly masterminding the scam.
The State government had banned registration of new three-wheeled contract carriages in the capital through an order dated August 6, 2002.
This meant no more issuing of new permits to autorickshaws. The order, however, had a provision to allow existing permit holder to purchase a new three-wheeler -- only to be run with LPG or CNG -- if the older was condemned. This was supposed to be formalised through a certificate to be issued by the Nagole RTA office.
50 autos registered illegally
Using his connections in Trimulgherry RTA office, Raji Reddy managed to get registered nearly 50 three-wheelers in his name though no certificate of condemning old three-wheelers was issued, the CCS Inspector, B. Pratap Kumar, said. In some cases, he used the same certificate of condemned vehicle for registering more than one new vehicle.
On learning about the illegal registration of vehicles, the Trimulgherry RTA officials approached the Karkhana police who registered a cheating case and later arrested Raji Reddy.
The case was subsequently transferred to the CCS.
Raghavender worked in Trimulgherry RTA office from March 2011 to March 9, 2012, before being transferred to the present place. The investigators said the arrested clerk helped Raji Reddy in getting new three-wheelers registered and permits being issued to ply them on city roads. He allegedly abetted Raji Reddy in registration of 17 three-wheelers though certificates of condemned vehicles were not issued.
In case of 20 three-wheelers, the records were missing. “My predecessor didn't hand the particular records to me,” was the reply Raghavender gave to investigators about missing documents of those 20 vehicles.
