Patna, The Patna High Court has questioned the Enforcement Directorate and Bihar’s Special Vigilance Unit over their “failure” to act against several senior officials, allegedly linked to the multi-crore tender scam, observing that the authorities concerned appeared to be trying to “save some and implicate few”.
A single-judge bench of Justice Satyavrat Verma, in an order passed on October 15, said the petitioner, who is in custody, appeared to be a “pawn” rather than the kingpin of the alleged money laundering operation, with the principal actors remaining “behind the curtains”.
An ED report submitted earlier had alleged that Rishu funded foreign trips and other expenses of two IAS officers and their family members in return for securing government contracts, the officials said.
The bench passed the order while hearing the case in which Rishu Shree, a contractor, was the petitioner and ED Patna Zone the respondent. The Special Vigilance Unit in June this year filed a charge sheet against seven people, including an IAS officer, as part of its investigation into the multi-crore tender scam. The ED investigated the case following allegations of corruption in government tenders. During the investigation, the names of several engineers and officials surfaced. Based on inputs and evidence from the ED investigation, the SVU initiated a probe by registering separate FIRs. The court directed the petitioner to implead the SVU, through its additional director general, as a respondent and asked the agency to file a counter-affidavit explaining why the officials named by the ED were not arrayed as accused and what emerged during the investigation regarding their alleged roles.
The court observed that the ED’s response to its queries was “evasive” and raised doubts over the progress of the investigation, questioning “whether the alleged offence could have been committed by the petitioner alone in connivance with private players”.
