Senior Central Excise official, wife arrested

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) arrested an additional commissioner of Central Excise and his wife in a disproportionate assets case on Friday, reports HT Correspondent.

The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) arrested an additional commissioner of Central Excise and his wife in a disproportionate assets case on Friday.

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The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested VK Agarwal, currently posted in Vadodara, and his wife Pramila, head clerk in the Central Railway and posted at Currey Road in Mumbai, from their Matunga house.

The CBI registered the case in December 2007, when they found Agarwal had Rs 45.72 lakh worth of unaccounted for assets.

“This (Rs 45.72 lakh) was more than the known sources of income of Agarwal and his wife,” said Praveen Salunke, deputy inspector general, ACB, Mumbai. He added that the couple had a total of around Rs 95 lakh in assets.

Of this, assets worth about Rs 50 lakh were from known sources of income, the rest (Rs 45.72 lakh) was unaccounted for.

CBI officials said Agarwal and Pramila were arrested as they were not supplying satisfactory answers to questions related to some properties and assets in their names.

The couple owns flats in Versova and Vasai, and also has movable assets worth Rs 25 lakh, as well as other investments including shares, National Savings Certificates and gold worth Rs 15 lakh.

Salunke said Agarwal has not been cooperating with investigators for many months now.

On Saturday, the couple was produced before a special CBI court, which remanded them to CBI custody till November 16.

In 2007, the CBI had registered the case against Agarwal when he was posted as additional commissioner of Customs at Nhava Sheva port.

CBI officials said they had wanted to arrest him 15 days ago but he could not be located in Mumbai or Vadodara.

He was finally arrested when he visited his Matunga house.