CBI raids 14 locations pan-India
Jammu Tawi, April 21: Six months after former Jammu and Kashmir governor Satya Pal Malik claimed he was offered Rs 300-crore bribes to clear two files including one related to an RSS leader, the CBI has registered two cases in the matter and is conducting searches at 14 locations in connection with the charges. The agency has booked Anil Ambani's Reliance General Insurance Company and officials of Chenab Valley Power Projects Pvt Ltd (CVPPPL), among others, in the two cases.
The searches, according to the CBI, are being conducted at Jammu, Srinagar, Delhi, Mumbai, Noida, Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala) and Darbhanga (Bihar). The CBI said the premises are associated with the accused in the cases. These include IAS officer Naveen Choudhary, then chairman of Chenab Valley Power Projects Pvt Ltd, managing director MS Babu, directors MK Mittal and Arun Mishra. The firm accused in the case is Patel Engineering Ltd. They were all named as accused in an FIR registered in Jammu on Thursday.
A separate FIR registered in Srinagar on Wednesday named Anil Ambani's Reliance General Insurance Company and Trinity Reinsurance Brokers Ltd as accused.
“The CBI had registered two separate cases on the request from the Jammu & Kashmir government on the allegations of malpractices (i) in the award of a contract of the J&K Employees Health Care Insurance Scheme to a private company and the release of Rs. 60 crore (approx.) in the year 2017-18 and (ii) in the award of the contract worth Rs 2,200 crore (approx.) of civil works of the Kiru Hydro Electric Power project to a private firm in the year 2019,” the CBI said in a statement.
Jammu and Kashmir Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha said last month that Malik's allegations were serious. “As a person holding high office had said something, we have given our consent to the CBI for investigations in both the matters,” he had told reporters in Jammu. “And truth will come out after the investigations,” he added.
Malik, at present the governor of Meghalaya, last year alleged that as Jammu and Kashmir governor, he had received two files, one pertinent to “Ambani'' and the other to an “RSS functionary''. “One of the secretaries told me that these are shady deals, but he can get Rs150 crore each. I told him that I had come to Jammu and Kashmir with five kurta-pajamas and would leave with that only,” the former governor said. “I alerted Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who told me that there should be no compromise on corruption,'' Malik said at an event at Jhunjhunu in Rajasthan.
While Malik did not say anything about those files, he was apparently referring to the government's deal with Reliance General Insurance, part of the Anil Ambani-led Reliance Group. Malik had cancelled a deal with Reliance General Insurance to provide health insurance to government employees in October 2018. The other matter referred to civil works related to the Kiru Hydel Power Project.
The two cases were referred to the CBI on March 23 with the administration writing to the agency, “There had been allegations of malpractices in awarding contract of the J&K Government Employees Health Care Insurance Scheme to Reliance General Insurance Company Ltd and awarding of contract with respect to civil works of Kiru Hydroelectric Power project to a private firm. Reports in these matters were sought from the Finance Department and Anti Corruption Bureau. On consideration of these reports, the competent authority in the J&K government has decided to refer these cases to the CBI for investigation.”
In the case of Reliance, the CBI FIR has said that the allegations as mentioned by the UT administration “prima facie disclose that unknown officials of Finance Department of Govt of J&K by abusing their official position in conspiracy and connivance with Trinity Reinsurance Brokers Ltd, Reliance General Insurance Company Ltd and other unknown public servants and private persons have committed the offences of criminal conspiracy and criminal misconduct to cause pecuniary advantage to themselves and caused wrongful loss to the state exchequer during the period 2017 and 2018 and thereby in this manner cheated the government of J&K”.
An inquiry by the UT administration had found that the government had hired Trinity as a broker for finalizing group health insurance for government employees. However, the tender process initiated by Trinity saw only one bidder, Reliance.
