16-year legal battle ends in acquittal for state employees in DVAC case
CHENNAI: Two state government employees, one of whom died seven months ago, were acquitted of corruption charges by a special court for Prevention of Corruption Act cases in Chennai on Tuesday, 16 years after the DVAC registered the case.
The accused were V Lakshmanan, co-operative sub-registrar in the office of the deputy registrar of co-operative credit societies between 2005 and 2007, and R Padmanaban, then section officer in the tourism department, who died on February 11 this year. Both also served as office-bearers of a housing society in Thoraipakkam, where the alleged irregularities took place.
DVAC had charged the two with corruption, criminal conspiracy, forgery and criminal misconduct, accusing them of foul play in the allotment of two convenience stores and a shop site on a government-allotted land in the housing society. The case was registered in 2009 and a chargesheet was filed in 2013.
The court ruled that the DVAC failed to establish that the accused had received even `1 as bribe or that the alleged fake allotment orders for the shops were written by Lakshmanan or signed by Padmanaban.
Though beneficiaries of the shop sites testified they had paid money to Lakshmanan, the court said this did not prove that the allotment letters were prepared by him. The court also pointed out procedural lapses by the prosecution in presenting evidence.