Call it devil in disguise. A senior official of the State Fisheries department escaped in a thread from an imminent red-handed by the sleuths of the lokayukta police on bribery charge on Wednesday.
Harprasad Shrivastava, a Joint Director at the Fisheries department, demanded a bribe of Rs 1,000 from one lalaram Kushwah for signing an agreement, which lalaram was supposed to take one metric tonne of fish from Veerpur Dham. Officials said the contract was to be recorded in the dairy of the department and it was to be signed by an Assistant Director. However, since the Assistant Director was on leave for a training programme, JD Harprasad Shrivastava was assigned to do the agreement.
lalaram, unhappy with the bribe demanded, approached SP lokayukta and disclosed the whole development. With his inputs, lokayukta had started recording their conversations and laid a trap to arrest Harprashad red-handed. Meanwhile the Joint Director sensed that lalaram was double crossing him and refused to take the money.
This was also recorded in the memory card in lalaram’s mobile. The lokayukta source said that the talks of demanding bribe were recorded in a tap record. Why the bribe was not taken was registered in the memory card of lalaram. It further said Harprashad had demanded Rs 1,000 for the contract of Veerpurdham and Rs 1,500 for contract of another Dam.
On this basis the case has been registered.