Hyderabad, November 23: Taking advantage of a GO issued by the state panchayat raj and rural development department on readjustment of employees within districts, a senior officer of the railways and his associates duped nearly 100 aspirants promising them jobs in the department and collecting huge amounts from them.
The railway employee involved in the job racket is P Rajasekhar alias Raju, a divisional signal and telecommunication engineer in the Railway Electrification Department working in the office of the Chief Project Officer at Secunderabad. Rajasekhar, a native of Kazipet, did engineering at IET in Delhi and MBA in Chennai and joined as a junior engineer in the South Central Railway (SCR) in 1983.
Hyderabad police commissioner AK Khan told reporters here today that Rajasekhar invested huge amounts in the share market and other finance businesses and incurred heavy losses. He joined hands with his friend V Rama Mohan Rao of Kakinada and hatched a plan to cheat job aspirants of money.
Two more friends, Srinivasulu and Venkat Reddy, joined hands with Rao to run the racket.
“In 2009 a GO 383 was issued by the panchayat raj and rural development department (called reformation GO) to transfer senior and junior assistants, and attenders within a district. The accused secured a copy of the GO and misled job aspirants claiming that the GO was issued for creating new jobs in the department,’’ Khan said.
Rajasekhar convinced aspirants that they can get a job in the department and demanded money ranging from Rs 3 lakh to Rs 1 lakh depending on the post.“Rajasekhar collected an advance of Rs 25,000-Rs 60,000 from 91 aspirants and gave them fake job placement orders with the help of the three other accused,’’ Khan said. Police suspect that there might be more victims who might have gave money to the accused and the involvement of officials of the panchayat raj department in the racket.
After handing over the posting order, Rajasekhar made sure that the aspirant did not approach the department with the order by convincing him on one pretext or the other. “We got wind of the racket in April this year and had been working out clues and managed to bust it now,’’ Khan said.
“He is a fairly senior officer in the railways. Coming from the Indian Railway Traffic Service (IRTS), he gets a salary of nearly Rs 55,000 a month,’’ Khan said adding that a majority of the victims are from coastal districts.
–Agencies