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ACB gets a free hand to probe liquor scam
ACB Gets A Free Hand To Probe Liquor Scam . Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) is gearing up to resume its probe into the role of influential politicians in the liquor scandal in the State as desired by the High Court.
HC order enables to expose politician-liquor mafia nexus
- HC orders ACB to submit a fresh report in three months
- Says no officer will be transferred without its permission
- Kiran Kumar Reddy government had allowed the accused to go scot-free by stalling the probe
- Most liquor shop owners are considered to be proxy for politicians
- So far, ACB arrested 160 persons
Hyderabad: Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) is gearing up to resume its probe into the role of influential politicians in the liquor scandal in the State as desired by the High Court.
It is viewed as a herculean task as the exercise was left unfinished when Kiran Kumar Reddy government stonewalled the process allowing the accused to go scot free.
The High Court directed the ACB to submit a fresh report in three months by completing the investigation into the scam.
It also made it clear that no officer associated with the investigation of the case would be transferred without its prior permission.
Meanwhile, the ACB officials are hopeful of making headway in the mission as the division bench set aside a memo issued by the State government in 1999 to constitute an advisory committee to review the complaints against the elected representatives under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
With the latest HC's order, ACB has to conduct a fresh probe into all allegations made against the public representatives and to file a chargesheet against the politicos if it finds sufficient proof. ACB has to scrutinise a large number of documents already collected as part of the investigation from banks, liquor shops and godowns and send them for forensic examination.
According to it, the politician-liquor syndicate nexus need to be probed in detail and could be a time taking job considering the statements of witnesses and tallying of handwriting of the accused at the forensic laboratory.
A majority of the accused liquor shop owners are from below-the-poverty-line category and holding white ration cards. They are considered to be ‘benami’ or proxy owners acting as fronts for politicians and liquor dons. In the earlier probe reports, the ACB special investigation team had freed the public representatives from any question of guilt, stating that they did not find any sufficient incriminating evidence against them. But the same agency had arrested 160 excise, police, revenue and syndicate members based on the same material evidence available.
Prior to recording the statements of the public representatives, the agency sleuths had collected all pertinent ledgers maintained by the syndicate members. A member of the agency said, “Call details of both syndicate leaders and the public representatives are being scrutinised to find some corroborative evidence to prove that the politicians were receiving bribes from the syndicate.”
