Punjab VB Arrests Batala SDM for Accepting ₹50,000 Bribe

₹50,000 Bribe: The Vigilance Bureau went and snatched Vikramjeet Singh Panthey, Batala sub-divisional magistrate and municipal corporation commissioner, off the streets on Saturday after they caught him taking a bribe of ₹50,000. And to make matters worse, an astonishing unaccounted cash amount of ₹13.5 lakh was also found on him, the police said.

Acting on a complaint from Batala resident Amarpal Singh, the police ended up lodging a case against Panthey on Friday under Section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption (Amendment) Act at the VB's Amritsar range police station.

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“Complainant Amarpal Singh said that he had carried out road repair in the area under the jurisdiction of the Batala municipal corporation for which two bills of ₹1,87,483 and ₹1,85,369, totalling to ₹3,72,852, were generated. When he went to the MC office to collect the payment and met the commissioner, he was told to pay 10% of the bills, which amounted to ₹37,000. For this, he was asked to meet sub-divisional officer (SDO) Rohit Uppal,” a police spokesperson said.

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The complainant did not want to pay the bribe, so he visited the Gurdaspur VB office and the trap was laid. “Panthey was caught red-handed accepting a bribe of ₹50,000 by the investigating officer in the presence of two government official witnesses. Upon further search, an unaccounted amount of ₹13,50,000 was recovered. The case is under investigation and the accused will be produced before the competent court,” he said.

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