PA bribery: Rs. 30k found in dustbin Edu minister's staff in custody till Sept 26

PA bribery: Rs. 30k found in dustbin

Edu minister's staff in custody till Sept 26

State education minister Rajendra Darda's PA Deepak Karande (in focus) outside the sessions court on Friday

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) has found unclaimed cash amounting to Rs30,000 in a dustbin while searching the office premises of school education and sports minister Rajendra Darda.
The ACB sleuths on Thursday arrested Darda's personal assistant Deepak Karande, assistant Prashant Andhare and clerk Pravin Bodke for allegedly accepting bribe amounting to Rs65,000 from the secretary of a Nashik-based school.
The three were produced in a local court on Friday, which sent them to police remand till September 26.
Additional Commissioner of Police Niket Kaushik said, "The total bribe amount was recovered from them was Rs 65,000. Karande had taken Rs50,000 and Andhare Rs15,000, But Rs30,000 more unclaimed money was found in a nearby dustbin. Now, we are trying to find out whether the unclaimed money belong to the three or not."
"There is a possibility that the unclaimed money found in the dustbin could be the bribe amount, which was thrown by some staff members when the ACB sleuths were conducting the search," Kaushik said.
According to ACB officers, the complainant had submitted a proposal to the school education and sports department seeking permission to upgrade the school from a Class 8 education institute to class 12 as per the government rule for English medium unaided schools.
When the complainant did not get any reply from the department, he approached Andhare to find out the next step. But Andhare allegedly demanded Rs50,000 to forward the proposal.
"But when the complainant did not agree to give such a huge amount, Andhare reduced the amount to Rs30,000 and said that if this amount was not paid, the proposal would not be forwarded," said the ACB officer.
The victim finally gave Rs15,000 to Andhare, who instructed him to speak to Karande for further proceeding. "When the victim approached Karande for further process, he allegedly demanded Rs90,000 from him. He said he would take Rs50,000 as first instalment," said the officer.
Following this, the complainant approached the ACB and lodged a complaint. "Based on the complaint, a team of ACB officers laid a trap in their office in Mantralaya and arrested Karande for taking Rs50,000 bribe," Kaushik.
The ACB officers are also checking investments made by the three officers, their property and other assets.