MALKANGIRI: The IIC of Malkangiri Town police station Ranjan Kumar Sahu and sub inspectors (SI) Manas Kumar Swain, Kunal Kumar were arrested by Vigilance sleuths from Cuttack for allegedly accepting bribe of Rs 1 lakh from director of a residential college on Thursday night.
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While SI Kunal was caught red-handed by Vigilance ASP PK Patel as he was accepting the bribe from director of the Omm Bhurbhuva Swaha residential college Bidyut Chandra Das, IIC Ranjan and SI Manas were arrested for their involvement in the case.
Das along with principal of the college Bimal Sethy were arrested in June by Malkangiri police on fraud charges and later released on bail. They had alleged before the Vigilance Director, Cuttack, that the police officers were demanding Rs 1 lakh from them to provide them protection in the case.
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Based on the complaint, a 20-member Vigilance team laid a trap near the residential college in Malkangiri town at about 8.30 pm on Thursday and caught the SI Kunal, the investigating officer of the fraud case, while receiving the bribe money, said Vigilance SP, Jeypore, Harekrushna Behera.
The arrest of Kunal was followed by arrest of Ranjan and Manas. The three police officers were detained on Thursday night and later taken to Jeypore for questioning. Director General of Police, Rajendra Prasad Sharma on Friday suspended the IIC while the SIs were suspended by SP Jagmohan Meena.
On June 25, Das and Sethy were arrested following complaint by a Plus Two student of the college, Simanchal Patra that he was issued a pass certificate from Jharkhand Open University by the college authorities on payment of Rs 25,000.
He had failed to clear the Plus Two examination and when he demanded his transfer certificate, the college authorities told him that they would provide him a pass certificate from the state Open University and collected the money from him.
However, they handed over a pass certificate from Jharkhand Open University to him. When he wanted to take admission in Balimela and Malkangiri colleges this year, he was denied admission on the ground that the Plus Two certificate was not issued by a recognised institution.