New Delhi: The CBI on Friday arrested the Deputy Chief Labour Commissioner and a Labour Enforcement Officer of the Ministry of Labour and Employment, posted in Chandigarh in connection with a bribery case of Rs 1,30,000.
The agency also nabbed two middlemen and the employee of a private construction company in the case, where the public servants were taking bribes to help private companies violate labour laws in Chandigarh.
The probe agency arrested Munish Garg and Gurmeet Sidhu of Advantage HR Solutions when they were paying the bribe amount to Vivek Naik, the Labour Enforcement Officer accused in the case. Further the agency conducted raids at official and residential premises of the accused and recovered several documents pertaining to the case.
The Central Bureau of Investigation has alleged that Naik was collecting the money on behalf of Mahesh Chand Sharma, the Dy. CLC in Chandigarh and that Garg and Sidhu were brokering the deal on behalf of Akhand Raj Singh, an employee of Nagarjuna Construction Company.
The probe agency had on Thursday registered an FIR in the matter against Sharma and Naik for allegedly showing undue favours to private construction companies in exchange for a bribe in the form of quarterly payments through middlemen based in Bathinda, Punjab.
The CBI has alleged that Naik would help several private industrialists, businessmen, and contractors by overlooking serious violations of labour laws and the Employees' Provident Fund Act.
According to the FIR registered by the agency, Naik had close links to Garg and Sidhu, both partners in Bathinda-based Advantage HR Solutions and allegedly working as middlemen to broker illegal deals between officials of the Labour Ministry and private companies.
The agency has further alleged that Garg and Sidhu were collecting Rs 35,000 each on a quarterly basis from the private companies to broker such deals.