BENGALURU: The Special Court for CBI Cases has ruled that the corruption trial against M Ravindranath Reddy, Principal Chief Safety Officer of South Central Railway, Secunderabad, can proceed since there are incriminating material against him.
Manjunath Sangreshi, Principal Special Judge for CBI Cases, on March 25 rejected the application filed by Reddy seeking discharge from the case of corruption in the awarding of Mysuru-Ramanagaram Doubling Work.
According to the prosecution, Reddy, who is the accused No.1, and accused Nos. 2 to 6 worked in South Western Railway (SWR), at a relevant point in time and accused No.7, a private person, who is one of the partners of M/s Krishi Infratech, which is engaged in Railway works.
The Construction Department of the SWR had awarded several tenders from 2011 to 2018 to B’uru-based Krishi Infratech. While awarding these tenders, the applicant, who was the then Chief Engineer (Constructions), SWR, Cantonment, Bengaluru, and other accused persons entered into a criminal conspiracy with Suryanarayana Reddy, and awarded the tender to Krishi Infratech by flouting the norms.
For awarding the tender of Mysuru-Ramanagaram Doubling Work, the eligibility criteria were that the tenderer should have completed the execution of a minimum quantity of 19,640 Cubic Meters (CUM) blanketing in a similar work.
But the applicant, by entering into criminal conspiracy with the then Deputy Chief Engineer Mallasidda Banasode, who is accused No.2, obtained false work experience certificates for the same and thereby made Krishi Infratech eligible for the tender and finally awarded the tender.
Fake entries were made in the measurement book in support of a fake experience certificate and utilised the same for making payment to the tune of Rs 77.84 lakh to the firm for unexecuted work, causing loss to the railways.
Therefore, the CBI registered the case against them in 2020 under the provisions of the IPC and the Prevention of Corruption Act and filed the charge sheet against them. The applicant claimed that he had no role to play in the making of the alleged purported fake entries, and hence, there is no prima facie material for the alleged offences invoked against him.