Raid on road transport checkpost leaves anti-corruption bureau stunned

NIZAMABAD: Officials of Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) got a big catch when they raided a road transport checkpost in the district. The officials found Rs 1.14 lakh stashed at the checkpost collected in just four hours, which works out to be about Rs 28,000 per hour. The ACB team also found that motor vehicle inspectors operating the checkpost have been paying daily wage of Rs 5,000 each to the agents appointed by them.The surprise raid was conducted by N SanjeevaRao, ACB deputy superintendent of police, Medak and Nizamabad districts, in the early hours of Wednesday. The checkpost is located at the outskirts of Kamareddy town. Surprisingly, as the ACB team was conducting the raid, lorry and van drivers stopped at the checkpost and paid the fixed bribe amount to the agents.
According to Sanjeeva Rao, the raid was conducted following a tip off that a large amount of money was being illegally collected from motorists daily. After conducting a recce, the ACB team swooped on the checkpost at about 3am and caught one of the agents while he was shifting the bribe money from there
. Senior motor vehicle inspector S Ashok Kumar and his two agents L Krishna Reddy and D Narasimhulu were taken into custody.
The bribe quantum is fixed according to the type of the goods vehicle, for example, lorries with six-wheels or more have to pay Rs 300. According to sources, the bribe amount was moved from the checkpost every couple of hours to some location far away to avoid getting caught. Sanjeeva Rao said the agents were collecting money from motorists on behalf of the motor vehicle inspector. It is illegal to allow private persons into RTA checkposts. This is a major bribe catch from a RTC checkpost in recent times in the state.