MOHALI: Former IAS officer Mandeep Singh was arrested by the Punjab Vigilance Bureau in a case of allegedly amassing assets disproportionate to his known sources of income.
Sources said that Singh was called to the Vigilance Police Station on Monday late evening and after that he was arrested by vigilance sleuths. He was on Tuesday produced in a local court and was sent to judicial remand for fourteen days and then taken to Patiala Central Jail from here.
"We did not need his police remand as the vigilance had ample proof against him and our investigation was document-based,’’ said a senior vigilance official.
Singh, a 1991 batch IAS officer, had been facing investigation in corruption and disproportionate assets cases by the vigilance bureau for the last many years.
In September, 2015, the bureau had booked Singh in the DA case after a one and half year long inquiry, which started in January 2014. He had retired on May 31, 2015.
Sources said that Singh had amassed more than half-a-dozen properties during his service. He had two residential properties, one each in Sector 8 and Sector 34 in the city. Besides, his family owned a reputed hotel in Zirakpur next to Chandigarh. Also, they had around 200 acres of land in Chamkaur Sahib. All these properties are in the name of Singh’s wife and son. He himself does not own any property.
The vigilance bureau in it’s report had stated during the course of the inquiry that the family of Singh tried to sell of some of the properties but could not.
He tried to arrange a loan from a bank against one of the properties by putting his influence but could not do so.
He has also been booked by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the infamous panchayat secretaries recruitment scam in which allegedly 909 panchayat secretaries were selected by ignoring merit at that time he was posted as the director, rural development and panchayats.
In 2013, the Union government had granted permission to the CBI to prosecute Singh.
He had served on important posts in the state as he had remained the state transport director, secretary, forest and wildlife department and commissioner of gurdwara elections, Punjab, before he retired.