CBI files corruption case against ex-Rajasthan CM

New Delhi - Cong leader Pilot, sons of two ex-ministers also named in Rs25.6 million scam

Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Friday took over the ambulance scam case and re-registered the case filed by Rajasthan Police against former chief minister Ashok Gehlot, Congress leader Sachin Pilot and sons of two former union ministers.
CBI sources said that the agency took over the probe from Rajasthan Police after a formal notification was issued by the state and central governments.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje had asked the Centre last year to order a CBI probe into the scam.
Rajasthan Police's first information report (FIR), filed in June last year immediately after Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) returned to power in the state, has named Gehlot, Pilot, Ravi Krishna and Karthi Chidmabaram, sons of senior Congress leaders and former union ministers Vayalar Ravi and P Chidambaram, respectively. CBI came out with a brief statement saying the agency has registered a case against the directors of a private firm and public servants for alleged irregularities in the award of tender in favour of the firm by deliberately inserting technical specification.
The irregularities in the implementation of the project included excess bills claimed by the firm and paid to them and an alleged financial irregularities to the tune of Rs25.6 million in operating the ambulance service during the previous Congress rule was claimed by the police.
The Rajasthan Police, which also named officials of Ziqitza Healthcare, had filed the FIR on the basis of a probe into a complaint filed by former Jaipur Mayor Pankaj Joshi. CID-CB was investigating the case in which besides these names, former state Health Minister A A Khan, Sweta Mangal, the then CEO of Ziquitza Healthcare, Shaffi Mather, former Economic Advisor to Kerala CM Oommen Chandy and the NRHM Director were also named.
Gehlot, who was not immediately available for comments, had earlier said that the state government had failed to perform and the case was only to divert the attention of the people.
"When the FIR was lodged in June last year, it came to my knowledge that the officers were being pressurised to act in this manner," he had said earlier. Pilot, who is the state Congress chief, had earlier charged that the case was an attempt by the BJP government to malign Congress leaders and had demanded that a probe should be carried out by a Commission of Enquiry headed by a judge.

• India