The Kashmir Pulse

NEW DELHI — Former Jammu and Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik on Thursday condemned the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) searches at his premises in connection with its probe into a ₹2200 crore corruption case.

The CBI searched premises linked to Malik at R K Puram, Dwarka and Asian Games Village in Delhi, besides those in Gurugram and Baghpat.

“I have been ill for the past 3-4 days and am hospitalised. Despite this, the government agencies are raiding my house on the directions of the dictator. My driver and assistant have been raided and are being harassed. I am a farmer's son and will not be scared by the raids. I am with the farmers,” Malik said in a post on X.

Malik, who served as the Governor of the erstwhile state of J&K between August 2018 and October 2019, said, “I had complained against people accused of corruption. But CBI raided my house instead of searching them. You will not get anything from my house except my 4-5 kurta pyjamas. The dictator is trying to scare me by misusing government agencies. I am a farmer's son, won't be scared and bow down.”

The case pertains to alleged corruption in awarding a civil work contract related to the Kiru Hydro Electric Power Project (HEP).

Malik had claimed that he was offered a ₹300 crore bribe for clearing two files, including the one pertaining to the project.

This post first appeared on The Kashmir Pulse

SRINAGAR — The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Thursday carried out pan-India raids to probe the malpractices in the allotment of Rs 2200 crore civil works contract of Kiru hydroelectric project to Patel Engineering Limited by the Chenab Valley Power Projects Private Limited (CVPPPL) in 2019.

As per the news agency Kashmir News Observer (KNO), the CBI today conducted searches at 14 locations including Jammu, Srinagar, Delhi, Mumbai, Noida, Trivandrum (Kerala) and Darbhanga (Bihar) to probe allegations of malpractices in the allotment of civil works contract of Kiru power project.

The searches were carried out by the sleuths of CBI at the residences of the accused including Navin Choudhary, who was then chairman of CVPPPL, and others named in the FIR.

The CBI has registered FIR against Choudhary, MS Babu (then managing director CVPPPL), Arun Kumar Mishra (then director CVPPPL), Patel Engineering Limited and unknown others after the J&K Government recommended an inquiry into it.

Based on reports of the Anti-Corruption Bureau and J&K’s Power Development Department, the J&K Government last month wrote to the CBI to probe allegations of malpractices in the allotment of the contract.

The perusal of these reports reveals that guidelines regarding e-tendering were not followed while awarding the civil works package of the Kiru hydroelectric project.

In the 47th Board of Directors (BOD) meeting of CVPPL, it was decided to re-tender works through e-tendering with the reverse auction after the cancellation of ongoing tendering. But in the 48th meeting, the decision was not implemented and the contract was awarded to Patel Engineering Limited.

This post first appeared on The Kashmir Pulse