Rourkela: CBI sleuths Monday arrested the executive director of Rourkela Steel Plant for allegedly taking a bribe of Rs 1 lakh from a contractor to help him pass his tender.
The arrested executive director was identified as BP Verma. A representative Binay Kumar Singh of a multi-national company was also arrested from Verma’s residence.
The CBI team also raided the residence of Verma and seized Rs 20 lakh in Rs 2,000 denomination notes and several incriminating documents.
They inquired whether this money was received from someone or was exchanged for old Rs 500 and Rs 1000 notes. The team members continued frisking and conducting verification at his residence.
CBI sources said, BP Verma, executive director (Works) allegedly asked a company, Vesuvius India Limited, to oblige him with bribe as he “went out of the way” to hand over work orders worth crores.
The company official B K Singh decided to give the director an expensive watch and Rs 1 lakh as he felt that Verma was soon going to become the CEO and this might harm its future prospects, the sources said.
The meeting was scheduled Sunday in Rourkela about which the CBI got an input after tracking the mobile phones of the duo and carried out a raid at Verma’s SB-3 government residence in Sector-19, the sources said. The CBI sleuths raided Verma’s residence at 7 am when Singh was coming out after handing over the bribe to him.
During the raid, the bribe amount and the watch were recovered by the team, they said.
Monday, the CBI sleuths brought Verma and Singh to their office at Sector-4 where they were detained for some hours before being taken to Bhubaneswar.
The duo will be produced in CBI court Tuesday, CBI sources said.
Verma joined RSP as executive director on his promotion from Bokaro Steel Plant six months back. It is alleged he used to shower undue favour on the company during his stint in Bokaro Steel Plant and again allowed the firm to work in RSP after joining here.
A week back, he was transferred to the same post in Bokaro Steel Plant. He was designated to be promoted to the post of chief executive officer after working there as EO in Bokaro for some days.
However, his dream to become the CEO was shattered after CBI arrested him.
Trade union leaders Anand Mohanty, Prabhat Mishra and political leaders Dhiren Senapati, Biren Senapati demanded his ouster from service and a thorough probe into the seizure of Rs 20 lakh.
Verma’s arrest has triggered panic among senior officials of the steel plant. PNN