NEW DELHI, 30 April 2005 — The Bihar government will lodge a police complaint against former Patna District Magistrate Gautam Goswami on charges of corruption linked to flood relief, official sources said.
Media reports have alleged that Goswami and some others, including politicians, had diverted over Rs.170 million meant as flood relief to victims of last year’s floods.
The sources said the decision to file a first information report (FIR) was taken after Patna District Magistrate Sudhir Kumar submitted Wednesday his report of inquiry into the allegations. Goswami has denied allegations of wrongdoing. As the district magistrate of Patna, Goswami was the nodal officer for flood relief operations.
“The draft of the FIR is being prepared by the police and it will be formally lodged,” said an official.
Goswami has since resigned from government service and joined Sahara Airlines.
Bihar Chief Secretary K.A.H. Subramanian says the government has not accepted Goswami’s resignation.
Meanwhile, the Communist Party of India-Marxist Leninist (CPI-ML) has demanded Goswami’s arrest. It accused him of “massive bungling”. Charging the state administration with indulging in a “cover-up operation” by ordering a vigilance inquiry, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) also called for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the scam. “The administration has launched a cover-up operation to shield officials and swindlers patronized by Lalu Prasad and his brother-in-law Sadhu Yadav,” BJP Vice-President Sushil Kumar Modi said.
“The conspiracy aspects of the scam involving Lalu Prasad and Sadhu Yadav should be thoroughly probed,” he said adding the BJP would take legal action, including filing a public interest litigation (PIL) in the Patna High Court seeking a CBI probe if state government failed to hand over investigations to the agency.
— With input from IANS
