National Times Bureau :- The Punjab Vigilance Bureau (VB) has unearthed a major corruption racket involving the issuance of fake heavy vehicle driving licences.
It exposed a nexus between officials of the Regional Transport Authority (RTA) Gurdaspur, the State Institute of Automobile and Driving Skills Centre (SIADS) Mahuana, in Mukatsar Sahib district and private document agents operating in Gurdaspur district.
In this case, the VB has registered a corruption case against seven accused out of which four accused, including the Motor Vehicle Inspector (MVI) have been arrested.
An official of the vigilance bureau said acting on a complaint received from a resident of Pathankot, the Bureau has launched an in-depth probe against Pratibha Sharma, a Data Entry Operator at RTA Gurdaspur.
Following investigations, an FIR No. 32 dated August 4 was registered at VB Police Station, Amritsar range, under relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act, IPC, and IT Act.
He further added that the verification revealed that 23 out of 51 driving training certificates purportedly issued by the SIADS centre Mahuana, were found to be fake, as only 27 legitimate certificate numbers were on record.
“Crucially, system-generated fields like the unique certificate number, QR code and embedded mobile number within the receipt number could only be altered by institute officials, making these vital markers of authenticity. Any mismatch among these parameters confirmed fraudulent creation,’’ the official added.
The official further said that the investigation pointed to the role of private agents including Kulbir Documents Centre, Shelly Documents Center, GMD Documents Centre, and Punjab Documents, in sourcing applicants and facilitating forged documentation in exchange for bribes.
Financial trails showed direct payments from these agents into the bank accounts of Rakesh Kumar, a former RTA Data Entry Operator now posted at SDM Office Batala and Pratibha Sharma.
Sukhdev Singh, Light Motor Vehicle (LMV) Instructor and GI Driving In-charge at SIADS Mahuana, misused his access to the system to generate fake certificates, causing direct financial loss to the state exchequer by illegally claiming Rs. 430 government fee per certificate.
The VB has arrested four key accused: Sukhdev Singh, MVI and GI driving in-charge SIADS centre, who is a resident of Maidowal Kalan village in Gurdaspur, Amit Kumar alias Shelly of Shelly Documents Centre, Jagpreet Singh of Punjab Documents and Rakesh Kumar, currently posted in Batala.
Raids are being conducted to arrest the remaining accused, Kulbir Singh of Kulbir Documents Centre, Rakesh Kumar of GMD Documents Centre and Pratibha Sharma of RTA Gurdaspur.
All arrested individuals would be presented before the competent court tomorrow. Further investigation into this case was under progress, he added.
