E-Paper
CBI lays trap and nabs NCLT deputy registrar in bribery case
MUMBAI: CBI arrested NCLT deputy registrar Charan Pratap Singh for accepting a ₹3 lakh bribe to expedite a hotel ownership case.
MUMBAI: The Mumbai unit of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday arrested the deputy registrar of the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT)’s Mumbai bench, Charan Pratap Singh, along with one of his private acquaintances, for allegedly taking a bribe of ₹3 lakh from a hotel owner in lieu of helping him expedite and settle his proceeding before a NCLT court in his favour. The CBI also conducted searches at the premises of the accused duo in Mumbai and Lucknow.
The hotel owner, the complainant in the case, had a dispute related to his hotel’s ownership and associated financial issues with his brothers, a case that has been pending before the NCLT’s Mumbai court since November 2020. Of the ₹3 lakh bribe money allegedly collected from the complainant by Singh’s accused acquaintance Karsan Ganesh Ahir, ₹1 lakh was in real currency while the rest was dummy currency during a trap laid by the CBI at a Colaba restaurant on Wednesday evening, officials said.
The officials caught Ahir red-handed while accepting the bribe from the complainant on behalf of Singh. Singh was apprehended from a Colaba residence on Wednesday, and the duo was arrested at 4 am on Thursday and produced before a Mumbai special court.
The complainant had alleged that on May 11, Singh demanded ₹3.50 lakh from him for helping him in his pending proceeding by using his contacts in NCLT, Mumbai. After negotiations, he settled for ₹3 lakh, the CBI officials said.
The officials, while detailing the importance of the anti-corruption operation, said that the accused deputy registrar worked in the registry department at NCLT, which handles key administrative functions including the listing of cases before the courts. The CBI has in the past received information related to alleged irregularities in the conduct of such functions, the officials claimed.
The CBI told the court that the grounds of arrest of the NCLT official included his recorded conversations with the complainant in which he gave the impression that using his contacts he would get the matter settled in NCLT in favour of the complainant. It also said that the accused’s custodial interrogation might lead to “vital clues, regarding the involvement of other senior officials of NCLT”, if any, and for seeking his “voice sample”.
