NEW DELHI: A special CBI court on Monday convicted former JD(U) Rajya Sabha MP Anil Kumar Sahani in the LTC fraud case for attempting to avail travel allowance in 2012 using forged Air India e-tickets without performing journeys, officials said.
The CBI during investigation found that Sahani had submitted claims of Rs 23.71 lakh from Rajya Sabha in two sets of TA bills -- one having 20 forged e-tickets and 40 boarding passes in the name of the MP and nine other companions in March 2012, and another bill having seven forged e-tickets and 21 boarding passes in his name and his six companions in December 2012, they said.
The agency said 20 fake e-tickets were for purported return travel on the Delhi-Chennai-Port Blair route while the set of seven fake tickets were for the return journey on the Delhi-Kolkata-Port Blair sector.
An MP is entitled to 34 single air journeys per year, to be availed alone or with spouse or any number of companions or relatives.
Sahani had realised that his quota of travel was not complete so he entered in a criminal conspiracy with others to get fake e-tickets and boarding passes to make the claim without performing the journey, the officials said.
The attempts to get reimbursement did not materialise because Sahani, now an RJD MLA from Kurhani assembly constituency in Bihar, withdrew his claims of over Rs 14 lakh for purported travel on the Delhi-Chennai-Port Blair route on April 10, 2012 from the Rajya Sabha office on the apprehensions that his forgery may get detected.
Sahani had visited the Rajya Sabha office to collect his bill and tickets on April 10.
He destroyed the claim forms and erased his signatures from the documents but these records were recovered during searches by the CBI and their forensic examination confirmed the handwriting to be of Sahani.
The bills of over Rs nine lakh submitted by him for purported travel on the Delhi-Kolkata-Port Blair route were found inadmissible by Rajya Sabha officials who had cross-checked with Air India, which confirmed that these tickets were not genuine.
The CBI, which had registered the FIR on December 31, 2013, for forgery in claiming reimbursement of Rs nine lakh, had detected his previous claim of Rs 14 lakh, withdrawn by him, during the probe and had mentioned it in the charge sheet.
"It was alleged that during 2012, Anil Kumar Sahani entered into a conspiracy with Air Cruise Travels Pvt Ltd, New Delhi, and others with the objective to cheat the Government of India by claiming undue reimbursement of Rs 9.
49 lakh incurred upon purported air journey along with other companions," the CBI said in a statement on Monday giving details of the FIR.
It said the investigation found that Sahani conspired with other accused and attempted fraudulent withdrawal of TA by using forged tickets and boarding passes as genuine without performing actual journey.
The special CBI court rejected Sahani's argument that he had not received any illegal benefit in the form of payments or reimbursement of expenses in both claims.
The court said the argument "legally not tenable" as evidence has duly established two repeated attempts on the part of Sahani to fraudulently and dishonestly claim the amounts by way of reimbursement of travel expenses from his office on the basis of fake and forged documents and the same cannot be held to be mere preparations.
Special Judge M K Nagpal said the attempts "stood completed the very moment when the TA claims based on fake documents were submitted" in the Rajya Sabha Secretariat.
Non-payment of the amounts subsequently is not material as Sahani has been charged only for an attempt to commit the offence of cheating, he said.
The quantum of the sentence will be pronounced on August 31, 2022, the CBI said in the statement.