Charge-sheet filed in Gurugram RTA corruption case, dept inspector released on bail

Was arrested for allegedly extorting money through a tout for clearing files related to commercial vehicles

A city court has granted bail to a transport department inspector in a corruption case at the Gurugram regional transport authority (RTA) office, in which he was arrested for allegedly extorting money through a tout for clearing files related to commercial vehicles, officials aware of the matter said on Thursday.

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Officials said that Harbans Singh, 52, was granted bail on Tuesday and came out of the Bhondsi jail the same evening.

Officials said that charge sheet was filed against Singh and six touts — Gaurav Kumar, Saubhan Singh, Suresh Kumar, Amit Kumar, Sanjeev Mishra and Ashish alias Bholu — on November 8 after completing investigation against them. In the charge sheet, which has been seen by HT, police alleged that Singh used to take ₹1,100 against every commercial vehicle from a tout named Yash. The tout is yet to be arrested for issuing certificate.

Singh was arrested on October 21 when he had reached his residence in Punjab’s Ambala after evading arrest for several days.Names of at least four more transport department officials have surfaced in the case, but Singh is the only officer who could be arrested till now. Six touts have also been arrested in this connection. Police said that Amit, Sanjeev and Ashish, were still behind bars, while rest three have been granted bail.

Additional sessions judge Tarun Singal while allowing Singh’s bail plea observed in the order that the case trial is likely to take long and no useful purpose will be served by keeping him behind bars when the charge sheet was already submitted.

The co-accused had already been granted bail on November 17 and thus Singh’s bail application also deserves to be allowed, the court order read.

Public prosecutor, Vijay Sehrawat, urged the court to keep him in custody, while Prashant Yadav, Singh’s counsel, said that it was submitted that he had an unblemished service record of 34 years and was falsely implicated without any evidence.

The FIR in the case was registered at Shivaji Nagar police station on September 13, following a raid of the Chief Minister’s flying squad on the mini secretariat premises from where three touts, Gaurav, Soubhan and Suresh, were arrested with 21 files of Gurugram RTA office. The squad also recovered from their possession ₹40,500 allegedly collected from agents and owners of transport agencies and commercial vehicles on directions of transport officials for clearing new registration, permit, no-objection certificate and other files related to commercial vehicles. Further investigation led to the arrest of Singh and three more touts.

Following this incident, nine officials, including Singh, posted at RTA Gurugram were suspended on October 3.