Mumbai news: CBI arrests 3, including CGST official, in

Mumbai news: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on September 8 arrested three accused, including a superintendent from the Central Goods and Service Tax (CGST), for involvement in a ₹60 lakh bribery case, PTI reported.
The arrested accused have been identified as CGST Superintendent Sachin Gokulka who was posted at the anti-evasion wing in Mumbai, Chartered Accountant (CA) Raj Aggarwal and one Abhishek Mehta, it added.
The trio were caught while allegedly receiving a partial ₹20 lakh payment of the bribe, CBI officials told PTI.
The CBI case was registered based on a complaint of a businessman against six GCST Mumbai officials, including Additional Commissioner Deepak Kumar Sharma, Joint Commissioner Rahul Kumar, four superintendents — Gokulka, Bijender Janawa, Nikhil Agrawal, and Nitin Kumar Gupta, besides Aggarwal and Mehta, the PTI report said.
The complainant alleged that on the night of September 4, he was confined within the CGST’s Santacruz office for 18 hours before being released on September 5, it said.
“It was also alleged that during his confinement, Gokulka allegedly demanded ₹80 lakh bribe for not arresting him which was subsequently reduced to ₹60 lakh,” an official said.
In a statement, the CBI spokesperson said three other colleagues of the superintendent (all superintendents of CGST) also allegedly joined him in pressuring the complainant, including through repeated use of force and hurling abuses.
“The complainant was allegedly made to call his cousin while in confinement to convey the demand of undue advantage by CGST officers for not arresting the complainant and favouring him in ongoing probe by CGST,” the CBI spokesperson said.
He said the complainant’s cousin subsequently contacted Aggarwal, who further contacted other accused private person and senior CGST officers, including Joint Commissioner Kumar.
Aggarwal and Mehta visited the CGST office during the intervening night and negotiated the bribe with CGST officials, which was brought down to ₹60 lakh which was to be delivered by Aggarwal, as per the report.
“Out of negotiated bribe of ₹60 lakh, ₹30 lakh was allegedly paid by the cousin of complainant through an ‘angadia’ (hawala). Further, it was alleged that only then the complainant was allowed to leave the CGST Office the next day,” the spokesperson said.
“The CBI arrested CA (Aggarwal) red handed while accepting an amount of ₹20 lakh on behalf of CGST officers, out of the remaining bribe amount. Further, controlled bribe delivery was done to other accused private person, who was to further deliver the bribe to CGST officers through accused (Gokulka),” the spokesperson added.
During further trap proceedings, Gokulka called the other accused private person to meet him near Mumbai’s Oshiwara Police Station to collect the bribe, where he was also arrested.
“The CBI arrested all the aforesaid three accused involved in accepting bribe during trap proceedings. They were produced before the special court for CBI cases, Mumbai. The court granted police custody of arrested Superintendent CGST and CA till September 10,” the spokesperson said.
The agency conducted searches at nine locations at the official and residential premises of accused persons in and around Mumbai which led to recovery of various incriminating documents, he said.
(With inputs from PTI)