Sacked IRS officer arrested in corruption case

The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested sacked Indian Revenue Services officer Sanjay Kumar Srivastava on Tuesday in an alleged corruption case.

"He was arrested from Delhi," said a CBI officer.

Srivastava had allegedly passed 104 back-dated orders in June - when he was forced to retire, along with 11 other officers from the Finance Ministry, in a clean-up process adopted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's second government.

In July, the CBI had registered a case against Srivastava for alleged cheating, forgery and obtaining undue favours, and carried out raids at 13 locations across Delhi-NCR - five places each in Delhi and Ghaziabad, one in Noida and two places in Muradnagar.

The CBI said that it had registered the case against Srivastava, then Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeal)-I, Noida with the additional charge of Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeal)-II Noida, for purportedly deciding on 104 I-T appeals in December 2018, while they were actually decided in June 2019.

Among other charges, Srivastava also allegedly passed orders in 13 cases that were beyond his jurisdiction and the orders passed in the appeals were uploaded in the Income Tax ITBA system by him between June 11-13, 2019, after "demission of office".

Searches were conducted at the residence and office of Srivastava, which led to the recovery of incriminating documents, articles and electronic evidence. Apart from this, jewellery worth Rs 2.47 crore, cash amounting to Rs 16.14 lakh, watches worth Rs 10 lakh and balance of more than Rs 1 30 crore in his and his family members' bank accounts was found.

A bank locker surfaced during the investigation.

After he was sacked, Srivastava had also filed contempt proceedings against former Revenue Secretary Hasmukh Adhia and current Revenue Secretary A.B. Pandey, which were dismissed by the Supreme Court in July.IANS