Baripada: Vigilance sleuths Friday apprehended a tehsildar and an amin at Raruan tehsil office for accepting a bribe of Rs 15,000 from a person in lieu of issuing a land patta. Vigilance officials in plain clothes conducted a raid and made the arrest. The accused have been identified as Raruan tehsildar Satya Sundar Rout and Bhanjakia amin Lochan Patra in Mayurbhanj district.
Soon after, simultaneous searches were being conducted at Rout and Patra’s residence, office and other properties when the last report came in. According to sources, complainant Chakradhar Mahanta had applied for a land patta. However, the tehsildar and the amin demanded Rs 40,000 as bribe to issue the patta.
As per the deal, the duo had already received Rs 25,000 from Mahanta earlier. They were supposed to take the remaining Rs 15,000, Friday. Upset with their repeated bribe demands, Mahanta had approached the Vigilance officials who laid a trap to nab the dishonest officials.
As per the plan, Mahanta took chemical-laced notes of Rs 15,000 and handed it over to the tehsildar at his chamber. Meanwhile, the Vigilance officials in mufti reached the office and caught Rout red-handed. “The bribe amount of Rs 15,000 was an installment of the entire sum of Rs 40,000 which has been recovered from Rout.
Following the trap, simultaneous searches have been conducted at four locations linked to Rout and one location associated with Patra,” a senior Vigilance official stated. Vigilance PS case (No-19/2022) under Section 7 of the PC Amendment Act, 2018 has been registered in this connection. A detailed probe is underway against Rout and Patra.