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CBI Action: Officials said on Wednesday that the agency has arrested two people in connection with a bribe of Rs 22 lakh to another GST intelligence officer posted in Kolkata.
CBI Action: The role of a GST superintendent posted in Mumbai and a lawyer of a private company attached to an online betting website has come under the purview of CBI investigation. Officials said on Wednesday that the agency has arrested two people in connection with a bribe of Rs 22 lakh to another GST intelligence officer posted in Kolkata. On the complaint of Kolkata -based GST intelligence officer Vivek Pratap Singh, the CBI recently run a “reverse trap” in which he arrested Ram Sevak Singh and Sachin Kumar Gupta when he was allegedly bribing to stop the ongoing action against a private company. Vivek Pratap Singh was tasked to collect intelligence related to GST theft. During the investigation, they came to know about not complying with GST by a foreign online betting website, which had www.lordexch.com, www.lordsexch.com, and www.lotusbook247.com links.
Woman contacted herself by calling herself a lawyer
During the investigation, Vivek Pratap Singh got a UPI ID bankg.artimbe@oxymoney, whose banking name was Artimbe It Private Limited, which was the same in all the above links. The details obtained from the National Payment Corporation of India revealed a bank account, whose number was 8859370474, which was associated with prepaid payment equipment issuer, the optional technologies Private Limited, and Nitin Kapoor was its director. Singh issued a notice to the company, in which details of KYC, AOF, bank statement etc. were sought and he also contacted Kapoor on his mobile phone, and requested him to provide a form and bank statement to open an account of Anestit Technologies Private Limited. He was called by a woman named Priyanka, who described herself as a lawyer of the company and sought time to meet him personally to settle the case. Singh refused to meet and asked him to send the documents via post. After this, a call from a person named Abhishek got a call, who claimed to be a superintendent in the GST department in Mumbai. He allegedly reiterated this proposal on two more occasions through phone calls.
CBI gathered evidence by laying a trap
Singh immediately alerted the CBI and lodged an official complaint, which laid a trap to target the bribeler. To confirm the allegations, the CBI conducted a counter-sting operation with the help of independent witnesses, in which Singh agreed to meet Abhishek at a five-star hotel in Kolkata, where according to the agency, Abhishek was staying. The CBI sent a secret voice recorder to Singh, on which all the conversations were being recorded. When Singh reached the hotel lobby, Abhishek allegedly took him to his room, where he convinced Singh to take a bribe and directed him to ask for at least Rs 20 lakh to settle the case with Priyanka. He also offered help in fixing the bribe amount for more than Rs 20 lakh.
Two accused arrested
In the presence of lawyer Priyanka, while having lunch at the restaurant, Abhishek allegedly offered Singh to Rs 22 lakh, on which he agreed to say that delivery in Delhi would be finalized. He said that the agency had deployed a team in Delhi, who raided the premises and arrested two accused Ram Sevak Singh and Sachin Kumar Gupta, who had allegedly come to pay a bribe of Rs 22 lakh. In the FIR observed by PTI, the CBI has registered a case against Abhishek Katiyar, Superintendent, Audit Section, Principal Commissioner, Central Goods and Services Tax (CGST), Mumbai East, Mumbai, Priyanka Singh, Advocate and two companies Artimbe It Private Limited and Anemite Technologies Private Limited.
