Anti-Corruption Bureau officials on Wednesday arrested Medak district Additional Collector Gaddam Nagesh, Narsapur Revenue Divisional Officer B. Aruna Reddy along with Chilpiched Tahasildar Abdul Sattar in a bribery case involving huge sums of money.
Mohd. Waseem Ahmed, a Junior Assistant working in the office of the Assistant Director of Survey and Land Records of Medak and Kola Jeevan Goud, a private person, were also arrested in the case. ACB Deputy Director M. Ramana Kumar, supervising investigation of the case, said that K. Linga Murthy of Serilingampally from city and four others wanted to purchase 112.21 acres of land in Chippalaturthi village of Narsapur mandal in Medak. To get the land registered on their names, they required ‘No Objection Certificate’ from the Revenue authorities as it was in the list of Prohibited lands-22A, Mr. Ramana Kumar said. The Additional Collector demanded bribe of ₹1.12 crore to issue NOC at the rate of ₹ 1 lakh per one acre, according to the ACB official.
On July 31, the Additional Collector received ₹ 19.5 lakh from Linga Murthy as first instalment. A week later, he got the next instalment of ₹20.5 lakh bribe amount. But for some reasons, the complainant could not arrange the remaining bribery sum of ₹ 72 lakh to Mr. Nagesh, the ACB press release stated.
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Since Linga Murthy could not pay the bribe amount, the Additional Collector obtained an Agreement of Sale on August 21 from him for five acres of land out of the 112.21 acres he had purchased. Since cash could not be paid as part of the promised bribe, the officer decided to take the land in lieu of the deal, the ACB Deputy Director explained. The Agreement of Sale was executed in the name of Jeevan Goud (an alleged benami of the Additional Collector).
On July 31, Waseem Ahmed allegedly received ₹5 lakh bribe at the instance of the Additional Collector, the ACB officials said. Out of these 5 lakh rupees, Ahmed allegedly gave ₹ 1 lakh each to B. Aruna Reddy and Abdul Sattar as their share. During searches at Gaddam Nagesh’s residence, eight blank cheques issued by the complainant, Agreement of Sale executed in the name of Jeevan Goud along with other incriminating materials were seized. An unaccounted sum of ₹28 lakh along with gold jewellery weighing nearly 500 grams were found in RDO Aruna Reddy’s house.
The arrested officers and the private persons would be produced before Special Judge for SPE and ACB Cases.
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High drama
High drama took place since morning in the Medak district headquarters since morning on Wednesday as the ACB conducted raids on the residence of Gaddam Nagesh. Though initially it was not taken seriously, soon things started moving fast involving other officials.
Simultaneous raids were conducted at the residences of Aruna Reddy and Abdul Sttar, Wasim Ahmed and Kola Jeevan Goud, the benami of the Additional Collector. Raids were conducted at several places in the district as well as in Hyderabad.
This is the second case involving huge bribe of more than ₹ 1 crore. In the past, Keesara MRO Nagaraju was involved in a case accepting a bribe of ₹ 1 crore and was arrested by ACB officials.