The Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) on Wednesday detained a senior official of the Maharashtra government’s Directorate of Technical Education, a woman professor and two others for taking bribe to facilitate admission of a student in an architecture college in Thane district, officials said.
The ACB officials also recovered Rs 3,15,000 cash from those detained, which they had collected from 11 students, including the complainant in this case, they said.
Deputy Superintendent of Police (Thane ACB) Ashwini Patil said in a release that the process of registering an offence against the four at the Mira Road police station under the Mira Bhayandar-Vasai Virar police commissionerate was underway.
Those detained were identified as Jitendra Ramdasji Nikhade (54) Assistant Director of the Technical and Joint Director Divisional Officer at Bandra; Rupali Hitendra Gupte (50), professor at K L Tiwari College of Architecture located at Mira Bhayandar; Santosh Rangrai Hubale, (45), office superintendent of the college and Shreya Santosh Bane (46), senior clerk.
The complainant’s daughter was pursuing a course in an architecture college, which shut down. In order to get admission in K L Tiwari College and also to grant the change of subject, the principal of the college demanded Rs 30,000, the ACB said.
Professor Gupte asked the complainant to hand over the money to the office superintendent and when the complainant met Hubale, he made a demand of Rs 30,000 to be given to the Joint Director of Technical Education, it said. After that, the complainant approached the Thane unit of the ACB. Based on the complaint, the anti-graft agency laid a trap at the college office on Wednesday and caught Bane accepting Rs 15,000 from the complainant on behalf of the superintendent and the professor, it said.
During the inquiry and the raid, it came to light that the accused had similarly demanded Rs 30,000 from 14 students, the ACB said.
Further investigation is on.
