SRINAGAR: Farooq Ahmad Rather, Executive Engineer, Pahalgam Development Authority (PDA) was arrested by the Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) for demanding and accepting a bribe of Rs 10,000, a spokesman of the ACB said.

Corruption, a representational photo

Rather was seeking this money for processing a file which was pending since he was posted as Assistant Executive Engineer, Rural Development Department, Achabal, Anantnag.

Giving details, the ACB said they received a complaint alleging that Rather, the Executive is demanding a bribe of Rs 10,000 @3% for the MGNAREGA bills costing Rs 1.49 lacs and demanding a 1.5% share of Rs 4.25 lakhs approx. for already executed and released Capex works bills in block Achabal.

The complainants alleged that he is a contractor by profession, and had done the work under the MGNAREGA scheme but Rather is demanding a bribe for processing the file for the release of the payment.

The complaint falling under U/S 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1988 led to the registration of FIR No 08/2022 in PS ACB Anantnag and an investigation was taken up.

“During the course of the investigation, a trap team was constituted. The team caught red-handed Farooq Ahmad Rather, Executive Engineer, Pahalgam Development Authority while demanding and accepting the bribe of Rs 10000 from the complainant,” the spokesman said. “He was arrested on the spot by the ACB team. The bribe money was also recovered from his possession in presence of independent witnesses.”

This is the second arrest of an engineer from the Pahalgam belt in a month. On April 1, ACB trap-arrested Shakeel Ahmad Dar, Assistant Engineer, Rural Development Department, Block Pahalgam, Anantnag for demanding and accepting a bribe of Rs 5000 for processing the bills of Rs 98,776.

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