The Enforcement Directorate (ED) is likely to register an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) within the next 10 days in the alleged recruitment scam involving 1,198 livestock extension officer posts during the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party government in 2014. The move will pave the way for questioning former animal husbandry minister Raj Kishore Singh, retired IAS officer Yogesh Kumar and other accused.
the government did not order mass termination of selected candidates Although the appointments came under scrutiny after the alleged irregularities surfaced. Some suspensions and transfers followed. The state government ordered an SIT probe in December 2017, and an FIR was registered at the SIT police station in 2019 under IPC provisions relating to criminal breach of trust, cheating, forgery, conspiracy and destruction of evidence, along with provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
“An ECIR is likely to be registered within the next 10 days. The proposed action follows the EOW’s October 14 arrest of Yogesh Kumar, a 1980-batch IAS officer who was principal secretary of the animal husbandry department when the recruitment took place in 2014. The 72-year-old was arrested from Gomti Nagar in Lucknow. On February 19, 2014, divisional additional directors, Grade II, had sought the department director’s approval to appoint an institution to evaluate answer sheets from all 17 divisions, citing financial and administrative difficulties. The Livestock Extension and Poultry Development Service Rules, 2002, had been amended in 2013, during the recruitment process.
The EOW had also found evidence against the then minister Raj Kishore Singh, whose prosecution sanction was pending at the time. The EOW alleged that prescribed provisions were disregarded under pressure from the then minister.
Notices will subsequently be issued to the persons concerned for questioning,” the official said. Recruitment rules were bypassed to facilitate centralised evaluation of optical mark recognition (OMR) answer sheets, allegedly allowing manipulation of marks and undermining divisional selection committees, according to the EOW.
