ACB conducts raid on IAS Hanuman Mal Dhaka, a 2014-batch IAS officer, promoted from state civil service, has fallen in the net of Anti Corruption Bureau.
Dhaka, who is serving as Dudu collector, has allegedly demanded ₹25 lakh towards land conversion. Though he has not been caught red handed.
The ACB, in a midnight action, raided residence and office of Dhaka and his accomplice Hansraj, who is serving as Patwari.
Dhaka has been promoted last year from Rajasthan Administrative Service (RAS). He is 1997-batch RAS officer. He has served as joint secretary to former chief minister Ashok Gehlot, whose government is facing allegations of phone tapping and corruption charges in paper leak and mining scams.
What is the case?
According to ACB DIG Dr. Ravi, there had been complaints against Hanuman Mal Dhaka of demanding bribe of ₹25 lakh for a land conversion. The complainant has 204 bigha land in name of his firm in Dudu. Some part of his land falls under area earmarked as pond. Collector was demanding the money for not taking any action against the conversion.
The complainant showed his inability to arrange such a big amount and offered ₹15 lakh for the favour. The deal was finally locked at ₹15 lakh.
The complaint was asked to bring ₹7.5 lakh as the first instalment on April 15 to Dak Bangla which is the residence of Collector. The complainant didn't turn up citing inability to arrange money. He then approached ACB and filed complaint against Hanuman Mal Dhaka.
The ACB sent the complainant to Hanuman Mal Dhaka with recorder to verify the complaint. After verification, the bureau registered case again the collector under Prevention of Corruption Act and raided the residence and office of the collector.
Hanuman Mal Dhaka is the fifth IAS officer fallen in ACB net recently
Dhaka is the fifth IAS officer who has been raided after IAS officers Prem Sukh Bishnoi, Meghraj Singh Ratnoo, Inder Singh Rao and Nannu Mal Pahadiya in recent past. All five officers are promoted from state civil services.
Prem Sukh Bishnoi, who was serving as director fisheries, was caught taking bribe for awarding fishing contract. Meghraj Singh Ratnoo, who was serving as registrar cooperative, had been raided on allegations of disproportionate assets.
Nannu Mal Pahadia was caught when he was Alwar collector while Rao was trapped when he was serving as Bundi collector.
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