IRS officer among 5 arrested for seeking Rs 1.5 crore bribe | Lucknow News
Lucknow: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Wednesday busted a major bribery racket operating within the Central Goods and Services Tax (CGST) office in Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh, arresting five persons, including an Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer, two CGST superintendents, an advocate and a private trader.According to the agency, the case was registered on Tuesday, after the CBI received information that senior CGST officials, in active connivance with middlemen and private persons, were demanding illegal gratification from private firms facing scrutiny in GST evasion cases. The accused allegedly sought a bribe of Rs 1.5 crore in return for extending undue favours, including relief from coercive action and favourable handling of assessment and investigation proceedings.CBI laid a trap and caught 2 CGST superintendents red-handed while accepting Rs 70 lakh in cash. Investigators said the bribe was collected on the directions of the deputy commissioner posted at Central Goods and Services Tax Jhansi, who was allegedly the key official orchestrating the demand.The arrested officials included Prabha Bhandari, Anil Tiwari and Ajay Kumar Sharma, advocate Naresh Kumar Gupta and Raju Mangtani.The agency conducted extensive searches at multiple premises linked to the accused, leading to the recovery of approximately Rs 90 lakh, in addition to several incriminating property-related documents and a large quantity of jewellery and bullion. With further recoveries during follow-up searches, the total cash seized so far rose to about Rs 1.60 crore. Officials said the searches were still underway and more recoveries were likely.
