Metro scam: CID files charge sheet against ex-IAS officer

Ahmedabad: Gujarat police today filed a charge sheet against former chairman of Metro-link Express for Gandhinagar and Ahmedabad (MEGA) project Sanjay Gupta and 10 others, accusing them of syphoning off Rs 113 crore.

The 200-odd page charge sheet was filed before the special court for anti-corruption cases by the investigating officer and Deputy SP, S G Parmar. It accuses Gupta, former IAS officer, and others of cheating, forgery, criminal conspiracy, etc.

Others named in the charge sheet are his associates Radhesh Bhatt, Sudhanshu Kushwah, Chetan Patel, Prakash Patel, Sandip Patel, Govind Vanzara, Harinarayan Sinh, Tarun Padhiyar and Animesh Doshi. Bhalchandra Kaklute has been described as an absconding accused.

Bogus firms were created in the names of office boys and tenders awarded at inflated rates to them by Gupta, the main accused, it says.

False invoices were filed without getting any supplies for filling up the land at Motera for casting yard and depot, it mentions.

The investigation started after an audit revealed that against MEGA’s claim of 20.67 lakh sq mt land filling worth Rs 194.56 crore while work had been done only over 9.42 lakh sq mt, the charge sheet says.

Bogus bills for land filling work were cleared without any work done on the ground. The value of the material purportedly used for this was Rs 113.22 crore, it says.

The charge sheet also says that CID recorded statements of 301 witnesses.

CID arrested Gupta on May 14. He was chairman of metro rail project in 2012. He sought bail twice but failed to get relief.

Gupta quit IAS in 2003 to start his own business. He owns Neesa Group which runs hotels. He had also started a Hindi channel called ‘Jano Duniya’ which was later closed.