LAGATAR24 NETWORK
Ranchi, Feb.3: The Anti-corruption bureau will probe into the irregularities in purchase of toffees and T-shirts and sweets done on the state foundation day in 2016 during Raghubar Das government regime.
The situation came after chief minister Hemant Soren approved the probe proposal. The approval came at a time when a PIL demanding the probe is already pending before the Jharkhand High Court.
The irregularities came to the fore when in June 2021, MLA Saryu Roy had written a letter to Chief Minister Hemant Soren demanding a CBI or ACB probe into the matter of toffee and T-shirt scam. He alleged that the toffee, T-shirt, song-music, decoration scam in 2016-17 was more serious than the Meinhardt scam. He informed that all the central characters of this scam are related to Jamshedpur.
He alleged that a printed T-shirt and a packet of toffee were bought on the basis of nomination without tenders to be given to the children attending Prabhat Pheri on the morning of 2016 State Foundation Day celebrations on the pretext of less time. The toffee was procured from Lalla Enterprises at Sidgora, Jamshedpur and the T-shirt was purchased through Prakash Sharma of Kadma.
In the preliminary investigation, it was found that in 2016-17, Lalla Enterprises neither bought nor sold a single toffee, but under a conspiracy, took a cheque worth Rs 35 lakh from the government and paid (VAT) about Rs 4 lakh on it. At the same time, the Commercial Tax Department imposed a fine of more than Rs 17 lakh on Lalla Enterprises for hiding the sale of toffee.
The purchase of a T-shirt worth Rs 5 crore has been shown from Kudu Fabrics of Ludhiana, but the commercial tax department of Jharkhand government had not given a road permit for it. The Commercial Tax Department was not informed about such a huge consignment of T-shirts coming from Ludhiana to Ranchi, Jamshedpur, Dhanbad by road or by rail, but the payment was completed.
It was alleged that on November 15, 2016, a song program of singer Sunidhi Chauhan was kept for one hour amidst pre-determined entertainment programs. On November 9, 2016, in a meeting chaired by the then Chief Minister, the Chief Minister’s senior private secretary proposed to call Sunidhi Chauhan, on which an expenditure of about Rs 44 lakh was mentioned. The proposal got accepted, but the total payment shown on it was shown to be more than Rs.55 lakhs.
